


The Prince's Bride

by Word_Devourer



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: And folks; it's Princess Bride, And if you've read/seen princess bride it's the same one, Artistic License: Iocane Powder, F/M, Featuring 1 (one) major character death, Featuring Adrien as Royalty, Iocane Powder, Marinette as a poor bakers' daughter, More characters that haven't shown up, More importantly though the Miraculous Knockoff, Suffice to say I have no intention of messing with your emotions on that particular front, The knockoff, You should not be torn up over it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-26
Updated: 2019-09-23
Packaged: 2020-09-27 01:22:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 21
Words: 31,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20399353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Word_Devourer/pseuds/Word_Devourer
Summary: Contains: Fencing, fighting, torture, revenge, heroes, chases, escapes, true love, miracles, and, of course, Miraculouses.It's the Miraculous/Princess Bride story you've all been waiting for!





	1. Once Upon a Time...

**Author's Note:**

> For once in my life, I have an outline already drawn up going into a story; I did actually need the outline, since there are a fair number of changes, but I'm confident it'll work out just fine. I know what I'm about.
> 
> And, of course, if you haven't already at watched The Princess Bride (or read it, for that matter), I'd recommend it; it's kind of cheesy, and pretty old, but many many people swear by it as a great movie, and it makes me very happy.

Though, by birth, he was royalty, Adrien had spent the last several years being raised on a small farm in the countryside, where his trusting, innocent nature couldn’t be a target for political intrigue.

He spent most of his time either out, riding his horse, or trying to understand the strange girl who worked there.

Of course, being of noble birth, he’d only rarely been expected to do manual labor for himself, though, of course, it was hard to avoid entirely on a farm, but every time he asked Marinette to do something for him, he left the interaction feeling strange, and unnerved.

He would ask her to make sure his horse’s saddle was well polished, and all the response she would offer was a strange, stuttering, _warbling _sound, or occasionally even a small scream, before she would practically run away, red in the face.

For almost the first full _year_ he knew her, that sound was the only one he ever heard from her; at least, the only one directed at _him._ He occasionally visited her parents’ home, since they were bakers, and a noble’s diet does not, of itself, support farm work, and then, occasionally, he would hear what he assumed had to be her voice, speaking much the same as any other girl might, until the very moment she realized he was there, and then she would suddenly lose voice again.

It was a good voice, too, and he always felt sad that she lost it around him.

But, if there was one way she might find be able to speak around him, it would be with as many chances as he could give her, so he searched, every day, for what could possibly keep her mute around him, and made sure to ask her for something, in the seemingly vain hope that _this_ might be the time she responded with words.

It was just under a year after he’d first met her that he’d finally connected the strange, almost _laughter_ in her voice…

She was nervous.

She…

She _liked_ him, or…

He was amazed to find that Marinette might even _love_ him, and, as he realized that knowing it made him no less likely to seek out Marinette in the hopes of speaking to her, that he might just love her back.

It took him even _longer_ to muster up the courage to tell her, but when he did, Adrien finally understood exactly _why_ love was so… beloved.

The trouble began when his _father_ heard about his relationship.

Adrien never knew how word had reached him, but he’d received a strongly worded letter that suggested that if he ever wanted to _see_ Marinette again, he would have to call off any particular plans they had.

He’d been devastated, but to his surprise, Marinette wasn’t. She was… _Angry._ Her hands had clenched at her sides, tight fists.

_“I knew this would happen, eventually,” _she said, voice steadier now than it even was when she talked to him normally, and sighed. “I can’t blame him. I’m a baker’s daughter. I work on a _farm._ I have no Miraculous, and no fortune to buy one with. Any ruler needs to think about where his legacy lies, and no self-respecting one would let it lie with me.”

_“Then I’ll leave,_” he said, “he can find someone else to continue his ‘legacy,’ but I can’t find another _you.”_

“No,” she said. “If we did that… Neither of us would see our families again, our _homes._ But…”

He looked at her, uncertain.

“I know what I’m capable of, and I know what I’m willing to do to be with you. Your father wants a worthy suitor, and I want to _be_ one.”

He sighed, feeling the tears welling up in his eyes. “But… You’re already better than anything I could possibly deserve.”

Her face went red, but her expression was resolute.

“Then I just need to make the rest of the world believe it.”

Adrien had tried everything he was capable of after that, in the vain hopes of finding some solution that _didn’t_ involve Marinette going far away from him, but his father was adamant, and his mother could find no solution, and so, soon, _too_ soon, Marinette had left him, aboard a merchant vessel, to seek her fortune.

_“I will always come back,”_ she had said, boarding the ship.

_‘I will always come back,’_ echoed in his mind the first night since she’d left, when he’d slept uneasily in his bed, knowing that he couldn’t simply visit her if he couldn’t sleep.

_‘I will always come back,_’ echoed in his mind, as he finally made it through the first week without her.

_‘I will always come back,’_ echoed in his mind, almost a month later, some form of relief that at least _one_ thing in his would not abandon him, as his mother finally fell victim to the wasting sickness that had plagued her relentlessly for _years._

_‘I will always come back…’_

The echo finally died, as the news reached him of the ship Marinette had traveled on.

It hadn’t arrived. Instead, a lone man in a rowboat had made it to shore, half-starved, and almost dead of thirst.

He said he was the only survivor, and that the rest had been killed, _executed,_ by the terror of the seas, The Nine-Lived One.

Adrien had only heard the name in children’s stories his mother had told him. The Nine-Lived One was barely a man, or, perhaps, barely even a woman; the stories said that the Miraculous they wore had a mind of its own, bent towards destruction, and possessed its wearer, forcing them to its own dark ends. They had a certain grim honor, yes, but all accounts said they was utterly merciless, unrelenting, leaving only a single survivor to spread the dark accounts of their evil.

If the stories were to be believed…

Marinette hadn’t been that survivor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 'Murdered by pirates is good.'
> 
> But more to the point, an interesting challenge when AU-ing Miraculous into stories with princesses and dashing rogues, is that Adrien is both of them, which makes it a bit tricky, but in this case at least, I'm positive I've got the right character selection.


	2. Pain and Abduction

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As time passes, life goes on for Adrien, though he often wishes it would let him rest.
> 
> As he tries to hold back the flow of time, he finds that time has no intentions of letting him be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See, I want to do the appropriate interjections, such as you got in the movie, with the kid being upset about this potentially being 'a kissing book,' but here's the problem: This is the Miraculous Fandom. This being a kissing story is a significant part of the appeal for a lot of you, which kind of messes with the plan...  
Oh well. We will bash on.

The next five years passed as a living agony for Adrien.

Two of the people he cared for most in the world were gone, and his father…

Father had always been distant, eternally busy with the business of running an entire kingdom, but ever since Mother had died, he’d barely even been seen, always away with Nathalie, or secreted away, working on who _knew_ what. Even Nathalie, who had previously at least been _present,_ was gone most of the time, running errands that she was never willing to explain.

Adrien only had a few hints regarding the strange fervor in his father’s actions. The small packages that arrived occasionally, which he recognized as the boxes that Miraculouses were usually stored in; he knew that all but the most lackluster of Miraculouses were _incredibly_ expensive, usually only acquired by inheritance, bloodshed, or the offer of a _great deal_ of money.

His father didn’t have many relatives to inherit from, so Adrien could only hope that he had simply become a collector to keep his mind off of what had happened to his wife, through legitimate means.

Even _that_ wouldn’t explain why the urge had overtaken him with such _strength._

Adrien, already half-despairing, was only forced deeper into the state when his father had informed him that he was pursuing a match between Adrien and the princess of The Gilded Kingdom, which was their rather contentious neighbor across the sea.

He should have been glad; The Gilded Kingdom was _remarkably_ rich, and generally considered one of the more powerful in the area. They were even known for having a Miraculous carried in the royal family; a single cut from the blade of its wielder could freeze even the strongest warrior in their tracks, and it was widely regarded as one of the more powerful Miraculouses.

By all accounts, this marriage would secure their position, financially and politically.

But for Adrien, still bleeding over the loss of Marinette, there was no comfort. All he knew was that he could promise nothing of his own wellbeing if he was truly to be wed to someone when the only person he could imagine loving was _dead._

And, though he knew it was pointless, he couldn’t help wanting to get away from the castle, away from the future that he knew he couldn’t truly avert.

The particularly suspicious observer might have taken notice of the fact that the day Gabriel finally let his son return to the farm he’d kept him away from for so long was the same day he told Nathalie to recruit a few quiet workers to do a bit of _work_ for him.

But… Any such observer either didn’t exist, or didn’t think to tell Adrien.

...

Adrien had little respite from his own mind, except for riding his horse, which meant that he’d become known for it in the village nearby… That, and purchasing significant supplies of breads and pastries from Marinette’s parents; he’d always associated Marinette with the smell of bread, and every time he walked in, he could imagine, for a second, that she would be in there, waiting for him. And… Even if she wasn’t, he could at least stay for a time, and talk to her parents.

They’d made it clear that they didn’t blame him for her leaving, and had, in fact, been the closest thing to a proper family that he’d _had _since the news had arrived_._

Still, sometimes he just wished that when he went for a ride, he’d be able to keep riding forever, never having to return to the memories of his life; maybe he’d find something more arresting than the old couple he’d run into once or twice.

But, every time, he ran up against the coast, and little though he wanted to stay, he couldn’t just throw himself into the water. He owed it to Marinette.

Of course, that didn’t make things any easier, and it certainly didn’t make it any less distressing that the ride was becoming so ingrained in his mind that he was almost free to think on the road.

It was on a day when the issue was weighing particularly hard on his mind that he found the path forward occupied.

Jolted from his thoughts, Adrien reached down, and pulled back on the reins.

On the path in front of him, there were three people.

The first, in the front, was a strikingly pretty woman, wearing a well-tailored outfit with orange accents that must have cost her a great deal. Her expression was the very picture of innocent uncertainty.

Behind her were two others, wearing what Adrien, from his years spent in rich society, recognized as the strange, unnatural clothes that came from using a Miraculous. One was a man, quite tall, and strongly built, hooded, and in green. The other was a woman in orange, gently twirling what looked like a small instrument in one hand.

“Hello,” said the woman in the front. “We’re itinerant workers, but we seem to have lost our way. I don’t suppose there’s a town, or a village nearby?”

“No, there’s nobody around. Not for miles.”

Her expression of confusion shifted slightly, and the smile she was wearing unnerved him a bit more than he’d have expected.

“Probably for the best. We wouldn’t want anybody having to listen to you scream.”

Adrien blinked, and managed to register the threat as the man in green stepped forward. Adrien reached up for the reins to try and turn around, but suddenly he was in his face, and Adrien had the peculiarly unpleasant sensation of being neatly pulled off of his horse and having an arm around his neck.

He flailed for only a few seconds, before his vision went dark.

...

As the other two carried their target into the boat, the one who had been talking stood by the horse, which seemed to know _something_ seemed wrong.

As a sound reached them, the woman looked up. “Are you tearing… _clothes,_ Lila?”

_“Am I tearing clothes,”_ mimicked the woman, _Lila,_ under her breath. She held up the piece of cloth in her hand; cream fabric, with the insignia of a bee on it. “Of course I am. With the right insignia in the right place you can start a war like it’s nothing.”

She slapped the horse. “_Go.”_

“When the horse arrives, the insignia will give Gabriel ample reason to say that the very people he’s trying to marry his son off to have _abducted_ his son. When he catches and supposedly kills the mercenaries stealing him away, _in their territory_, there’ll be no denying that they were trying to steal him. All the evidence he needs to start a war, or, well, blackmail them into silence.”

“Hold up,” said the man who had choked Adrien out, “did you say something about _killing_ these mercenaries? That’s _us,_ right?”

“Of course it is, but he’s not going to _actually _kill us, he’s just going to _say_ he has so there’s supposedly nobody around with any information that could let his ruse fall through.”

“I think at that point he’d probably just _actually_ kill us so there really _isn’t_ anybody to let it slip,” said the man, giving her a confused expression.

There was a long second of silence, as he cringed away from the nasty expression that spread across Lila’s face.

“Excuse me, _Nino?_ You _think?_ You _think_ that he’d do that? Did I hire you to _think?_ Would I have even _taken_ this job if I thought it would get me killed? Do you _doubt_ my ability to talk my way into getting _exactly_ what I bargained for?”

“No, I’m pretty sure Nino’s right,” said the other woman, pulling the plank up into the boat.

“Ohhh!” said Lila, turning to face her, “our _town gossip_ has spoken. You remember when I found you, Alya? Out of money, _desperately_ looking for some kind of lead on your _blue woman?_ You were so hungry, I could probably have just taken your Miraculous _outright_ in exchange for a few coins, and frankly, it would probably have been more profitable to sell it than it’s been to have you work for me. I’m the only reason you didn’t die of starvation or have to resort to _low_ forms of work, so which of us do you think knows what they’re _talking_ about?”

“We’re literally here to start a war,” she said, offended but chastened, “I don’t think it gets lower than that.”

“This is a prestigious art, with a long and glorious tradition,” scoffed Lila, rolling her eyes.

She turned to Nino. “And _you!_ All that muscle and armor, and you couldn’t avoid almost getting _cooked in your shell._ Do you want me to send you back to where I found you? Roasting on a pyre?_ In Greenland?”_

She shook her head in annoyance, and walked up to the front of the boat.

They watched her pass behind the sail, which still hadn’t been raised fully.

Nino silently set to work cranking it into position.

Alya watched him, noted the slightly defeated look he wore, and took a step forward.

She paused a second, and thought through her next words.

“I doubt that Lila truly wants us harmed / She really just seems kind of stressed to me.”

Nino looked at her, and let out a short chuckle, then closed his eyes for a second, as if thinking.

“Well, if she did, I’d surely be alarmed / But why’s she got to pass the stress to... we?” He shrugged, as if admitting a slight defeat on his rhyme.

She laughed. “I always like how you’re so good at these.”

“I worked for years, at this point, it’s a breeze.”

“Enough of that!” said Lila, from the front of the boat, as the sail rose high enough to get them moving.

“So Nino, tell me, are there rocks ahead!?” called Alya, seemingly oblivious to Lila’s annoyed tone.

“Who says I know? If so, we'll soon be dead!”

“What did I say? Stop with the rhyming!”

Nino grinned, and made a visible effort to restrain himself, but then laughed.

“I was done anyway, so, perfect timing!”

That seemed to be the last straw for Lila.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I kind of forgot how heartwarming Inigo and Fezzik were in the movie until I was watching clips to make sure I wasn't going too far off from reality.
> 
> And I figured, since DJ isn't exactly a career when this is set, the fact that Fezzik has a love of rhyme is easy to rebrand as Nino enjoying improv-ing poetry with Alya.


	3. Floating Away From Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They've been hired to prepare a war, and by all rights that should go smoothly, but...  
What's behind them?
> 
> Adrien tries to find out.

Unrequested improvised poetry and subsequent verbal lambasting aside, the boat ride passed in relative silence. Adrien had woken up after a few minutes, but by that time, they’d already had him securely tied up, and by all accounts, he’d never learned how to fight anyway, nor, for that matter, work a boat.

The trip passed in uncomfortable silence, but it passed. The first night was largely uneventful, but late in the second, though…

Alya had noted the temper of the water beneath them shifting again; presumably the sign that they were getting near land, a few minutes ago, and Lila had almost immediately gone to the front of the boat, scanning quietly.

After a minute she stepped back, smiling.

“We should reach the cliffs by morning.”

Alya turned to her.

“What?”

Lila rolled her eyes. “I said, we _should reach the cliffs by morning._ Were you not listening?”

Alya shrugged. “I was just making sure we weren’t being followed.”

“To quote the Gilded Princess, who I’ve spoken to _many_ times, that would be _‘utterly ridiculous.’_”

“You should know,” said Adrien, breaking the silence he’d kept for two days now, “despite what you think, you _will_ be caught. And, when you are, I have no doubt that you’ll be hanged.”

Lila, all confidence, leaned forward. “I’m not worried about my neck. You on the other hand, might have to worry about yours if you keep talking; I’m more than willing to let Nino keep choking you if that’s what it takes to keep you quiet. _And stop looking back, Alya.”_

“Let me run this past you one more time; you’re _sure_ nobody’s following us?”

_“How _would anybody be following us, Alya? The Gilded Kingdom has no way of knowing what we’ve done, and _his_ horse would have taken at _least_ an hour to get back, and if you add in the time it would take them to get any significant search party to a boat, and the idea that _anyone_ would have caught up with us yet is _inconceivable._”

There was a long silence, as Alya and Lila held eye-contact.

Lila’s head quirked to the side, as she seemed to catch something behind Alya’s eyes.

“Our of… _raw_ curiosity, why do you ask.”

Alya shrugged. “No reason. I just looked behind us, and there was something there.”

_“What?”_

Nino, visibly concerned, stood from where he’d been about to take a nap, and the three of them looked back, into the night.

“I swear…” said Alya.

A second passed.

Two seconds.

_Ten._

Lila was pulling away, as…

There was a flash, a tiny _flicker_ of light, from far in the distance behind them.

They froze

A persistent glint came from behind them, almost _green,_ and as they stared, the clouds shifted enough that in the moonlight.

There was a boat, barely a silhouette against the night, but undeniably _there,_ and barely visible, black on black…

The only way they were even capable of _spotting_ them was the light they’d seen, which seemed to be shining in the figure’s eyes.

There was a long silence.

“Probably…” said Lila, not quite able to hide that she was struggling, “We’re… We’re getting close to shore now, so… It’s probably just a local fisher, out for a… A pleasure cruise at night…”

There was a long silence.

“In eel infested waters…”

They looked at her.

She spun on her heel, and turned away, waving a hand nonchalantly. “It doesn’t matter, either way, of course. Whoever they are, they couldn’t catch us anyway; we’re too far ahead.”

“Mm… I dunno, dude, not an expert, but it looked like a pretty fast ship.”

_“Boat._ _At that size it’s a boat,”_ corrected Lila.

“You just don’t want to think there’s a _ship_ after you."

_“Shut up, Alya.”_

There was a splash, close to their boat, and as they turned, they saw the ropes that had been holding Adrien, limp on the deck, and in the water, Adrien himself, swimming furiously away.

Lila, for a second, seemed shocked, and then she spun to Alya.

_“Well? In! after him!”_

“I don’t swim.”

Visibly enraged, she turned to Nino, who put up his hands.

“Not well enough to force him to come with me.”

Lila groaned, and spun, rushing for the helm.

_“Veer left. Left!”_

Adrien, frankly, hadn’t been thinking very hard when he’d leapt overboard. All he’d known was that he wouldn’t get many more chances to make use of the fact that he’d slipped his bonds, that _someone_ was following them, and that there weren’t exactly many boats that would be worse to join than _this_ one.

So, he’d leapt, relying on the few times he’d gone swimming in the hopes that the boat they’d spotted might be close enough he could reach it.

Now, though, he was in deep water, and he couldn’t see what they’d all been looking at.

Nonetheless, he pressed forward, hoping that…

There was a sound.

Adrien had heard a great many things, both natural and human, and this sounded like _none_ of them. It was a rasping, almost hypnotic sound, that seemed to rise strangely from the water around him.

He didn’t like it.

“You hear that sound, don’t you?” came Lila’s voice from behind him. She sounded angry, but more than that, she sounded… _worried?_ “Those are the shrieking eels. If you don’t believe me, just wait a _bit_ longer. They always grow louder when they’ve spotted something to _eat._”

As if on cue, the sound swelled around him.

“If you swim back now, you’ll be safe on the boat; I have no intention of harming my _paycheck._ The eels, on the other hand… To them, you’re just _food._”

He froze, uncertain whether this was some kind of ruse, or whether he truly _was_ in danger; his body said he was, already shivering.

Something brushed against him in the water, some little point, a tooth, perhaps, snagging on his shirt, and he felt his whole body stiffen again, as is trying to let him drown.

His breathing was rapid and tense, but he managed to hold himself still, hoping against hope that they might not notice him if he didn’t move.

The sound, the _shrieking,_ was all around him now, and if Lila had been telling the truth, and he feared now that she _was,_ then that dark shape in the water, coming towards him, meant to _eat _him.

The one he’d felt mere moments ago seemed to have finally zeroed in on his position, and it was rising out of the water, a slick black, eerily smooth, and its mouth cracked open, wider and wider, those _teeth_ coming for him.

He tried to put up his hands, knowing that he couldn’t swim with just his feet, and fell back away from it, knowing that as he did so that he was defenseless.

That shrieking echoed in his bones, now, and as he managed to force his eyes open again, it was to jaws, now upon him, coming straight for his neck.

And then—

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> He doesn't get eaten by the eels at this time.
> 
> The eel doesn't get him.  
I just figured I should tell you so you don't get frightened.


	4. The Falls of Insanity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adrien is, as promised, not gotten by the eels at this time.
> 
> Still, he's far from safe, still in the clutches of three dangerous mercenaries, and soon, his safety is left even further behind, as they make landfall, and must contest with the Falls of Insanity.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "You hear that sound, don't you? Those are the shrieking eels."
> 
> Ah, no, wait, we're past that part.  
Let's see...
> 
> He was in the water, the eel was coming after him, he was frightened. The eel started to charge him, and then...

Something large came crashing down on the eel, and were he able to, Adrien would have jumped.

His eyes focused on a large, green shield, that after an instant he recognized as the one the man, _Nino,_ kept on his back.

Even as he realized it, the same strong arm that had choked him into unconsciousness barely a day ago came down, and pulled him bodily out of the water and back onto the boat.

_“Put him down, just put him down,”_ said Lila, seemingly mostly exasperated at Nino.

“Yeah, he’s _definitely_ getting closer,” said Alya, already moving on from the incident, looking back at their pursuer.

“He’s no concern of ours. _Sail on!”_

Lila looked down at Adrien, a strange, unnerving expression on her face.

“I suppose you think you’re _brave_ with a stunt like that,” she said.

Adrien, shivering but defiant, looked her in the eye.

“If you think _I’m_ brave, that tells me more about _you_ than anything.”

Lila’s expression curled into what would almost have been a _snarl._

Then, she straightened.

“Well. Say what you like, then,” then, aside to Nino, “make sure he’s tied up _properly_ this time. You hear that sound, though? You’ve lost us time, and our pursuer might be gaining, but too late.”

He _did_ hear ‘that sound,’ a distant sound, like rain, or…

“The Falls of Insanity!” said Lila standing up, staring into the distance at something Adrien couldn’t see.

She spun. “Alya, catch every bit of wind we can get. We’re getting there by _dawn,_ and we’re getting there ahead of our little tail.”

By dawn.

Adrien managed to twist his head as Nino indefatigably retied the ropes, and…

Yes. The light on the horizon _would_ mean that the sun was rising. With the… Cliffs? With the cliffs above, he could imagine that it would already be morning, were it not for the fact that that the sun was being blocked.

The boat, after the brief interlude of action, was quiet again, but a different kind of quiet. Lila was at the bow, staring out at the cliffs. Alya, behind her, was managing the sails. Nino had, to Adrien’s surprise, started on breakfast, which he was eating with the certain dutiful manner of one who knows he’ll need it.

He did offer Adrien some of his bread, though, which Adrien was willing to accept.

And so, the sun slowly rose, and the boat behind them, and its occupant, became steadily more visible.

The impression they’d gotten earlier was accurate; it was a dark boat, and the occupant seemed almost pitch black, and clearly no weak mariner.

“I wonder if it’s still the same wind back there,” muttered Alya, looking back for the 20th time in the hour.

“Yeah, she’s _definitely_ gaining on us,” said Nino, who’d had much less urgent business to attend to in the meantime.

_“She?”_ asked Lila.

“I mean, if I had to guess? I’m pretty sure she’s got a _real_ long braid in the back, so… Looks like a ‘she’?”

“It doesn’t matter. Our dock is at the base of the falls. We’re almost there,” said Lila, seemingly more to herself than anything.

They _were_ in fact, almost there, landing, yes, hundreds of yards ahead of their pursuer, but _only_ hundreds of yards.

“Right,” said Lila, staring up at the falls. “Nino?”

“On it,” said Nino, cracking his neck, and stepping forward.

Adrien looked up.

And up.

The falls stretched out above him, a wide curtain of water.

It seemed like a _sheet,_ which begged the question of how they were supposed to…

He looked back down, and saw Nino pressing forward, on a narrow path of stones that led directly to the center of the falls.

He blinked, as he made out what the path led to…

_“A ladder?”_

Cut into the stone of the falls, with only the barest respite in the water passing above it, was, indeed, a ladder.

Nino reached up a hand, and, after a second, a pale green aura hovered above him, coalescing into a shield, much like the one on his back.

Lila pushed him forward.

“You’ll want to stay close behind him,” she said, “I doubt you’ll have any luck without a _shield._

He could see Nino’s eyes, closed in concentration, and then… He opened them, his breathing steady and even. The shield remained.

“Alya, make sure he _goes,”_ said Lila, as she followed Nino as he started climbing.

A second passed, and Alya and Adrien shared a glance.

Alya shrugged.

“After you, then.”

Despite himself, Adrien had almost picked up part of their fear for their mysterious pursuer.

He started climbing.

Minutes passed, and rung by rung, step by step of slick rock, Adrien kept climbing, trying not to think about what would happen if he slipped.

Still, with Nino’s shield above them, the muted drum of the falls actually wasn’t too bad; after all, they’d gotten some significant distance from the part where _most_ of it was clattering. There was a distant roar below, of course, but the noise wasn’t so bad that he couldn’t hear…

“Hey Lila? She’s climbing the ladder” came from below

_“What?”_ came from above.

“I said-

“I heard you the first time! How!”

“I think it’s kind of a one hand in front of the other thing. If I had to guess, she's using her feet, too.”

“Inconceivable!”

“Yeah, well the other thing is that I’m pretty sure she’s _gaining_ on us.”

At the statement, Adrien feels an instant of pause from above him, and then Lila keeps moving, faster than before. She doesn’t seem willing to offer any legitimate response.

30 seconds go by. A minute.

“Still gaining,” reported Alya.

_“Faster!”_

“This _is_ faster!”

“You were supposed to be unbreakable! Unflappable! You were this mighty _machine_, and still she gains!”

“I’m maintaining a pretty hefty shield here, _and_ climbing on slippery rocks!” cut back Nino.

“I do not accept excuses!” said Lila, “I’ll just have to find someone _else_ to fill your job.”

“Come on, Lila, there’s no need for that,” said Nino, pushing upwards a bit harder.

Another minute.

“Do you have some _other_ job to rely on, is that it!?” said Lila.

“We’re almost there!” called Nino, back down.

“She can’t be more than 50 feet back,” said Alya.

And, sure enough, the water that had been splashing him from either side was becoming rapidly less forceful.

And then, with a suddenness that frankly surprised him, they were at the top.

There was barely even a splash of water as Nino reached the top and dropped the shield, and as Lila made it out, Adrien was able to see why.

The top of the ladder came out into a channel that sloped down to the precipice. There should have been a torrent of water, but at the part where the channel opened into the river, it had been blocked, a titanic boulder holding the flow back.

_“Nino. Now.”_

Nino nodded, and even as Alya made it to the top, he dislodged the boulder, and Adrien jumped up onto the higher, almost _dry_ ground of the stonework around the channel, as a rush of water eagerly pressed down and over.

A second passed.

“Well,” said Lila. “I believe I can consider letting you keep your job, since you didn’t _actually_ ruin this for us. The pursuer we _didn’t_ want to find us should be hitting the ground now, and the ones we _do _want to find us are doubtless on their way.”

“Now, it’s about time we kept moving,” said Lila, turning away.

“How good are her _arms?”_ said Nino, voice quiet from what sounded like honest wonder as he looked over the edge.

“Wh—” Lila matched his gaze.

_“She didn’t fall? _That’s… _Inconceivable.”_

“Lila. It _is_ conceivable; I am conceiving of it _right now.”_

_“Shut up, Alya,”_ said Lila, putting her face in her hands.

After a second, she straightened up.

“She’s still climbing, isn’t she…”

Alya looked over the edge.

“Yeah.”

The progress was _almost_ halted, but she was still moving, inch by bare inch, upward through the torrential downpour.

“Right. Well, whoever she is, she’s clearly trying to catch up to us, and at this point, she obviously knows that we’ve got _him,”_ she gestured at Adrien, “so… She has to die.” She turned to Nino. “You, make sure _he_ stays with us.”

She turned back to Alya. “Catch back up with us when she’s _dead._ If she finally _slips,_ then fine, if not, there’s a _reason_ I let you work for me.”

“There’s about fifty of those.”

“_Shut up, Alya, _and remember to take her Miraculous if she makes it up here._”_

Alya shrugged, turning away. “Fine, but I’m doing it without powers.”

_“We are in a hurry.”_

“If I rely on my powers, how am I ever supposed to be a threat in my own right?” asked Alya.

Lila groaned.

_“Fine. Whatever. Just catch up when you’re done.”_

She turned, and raised a finger at Adrien.

_“March.”_

As Alya turned again to look down the dizzying heights at their pursuer, there was a steady pressure on her shoulder.

“Careful, dude. Whoever she is, that mask’s meant to keep it a secret. People like that tend to be _dangerous.”_

“Nino! Now!”

He pulled away, and followed after the other two.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Coming up next: a scene that's functionally identical, but very different in flavor.  
Should be fun.


	5. At The Cliff's Edge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alya gets bored of waiting, and, understanding that her pursuer will not fall, and not wanting to wait any longer than necessary, offers to help her up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Theoretically, I have all the major beats I want this story to hit already laid out, and I should be moving on to the next every time that I complete one, but it turns out that sometimes, they're just really short, so I just consolidate them.

Considering what she’d already seen, the idea of the woman following them falling seemed laughable, which meant that it would inevitably come down to a fight.

That in mind…

Alya pulled away from the ledge, and surveyed the terrain.

She walked lightly up the edge of the stonework chute that sent the water down.

That, of course, was far too dangerous of terrain to willingly use.

Beyond that, sticking out of the river, was a pathway of stones, much like the ones at the base of the falls.

With the grace of a dancer, Alya traced the path, bouncing easily from one to another.

As she reached the end, she looked back.

The path was the obvious place, of course, but this river had once had a bridge across it, and two rows of thick stone columns, some of them crumbling, but most of them intact, stuck out of the water.

Tactically speaking…

Tactically…

Tactically speaking, this was boring.

Yes, she could spend the next _hour_ testing the jumps between all of the possible stones, and warming up every single illusion that she probably wouldn’t even _need,_ but by the time she did that, she’d be so wound up that she’d be making stupid mistake after stupid mistake.

Of course, she could make breakfast first…

She looked at the small pack she had with her.

Breakfast, and then… And then fight on a full stomach, which would probably make her throw up and _lose._

She stood up, walked back to the ledge. Maybe she'd be closer than expected, and...

As she looked down…

Well.

“Hello there!” she called, more surprised than anything. By some strange logic, it seemed that dislodging the boulder, for all it had made _most_ of the ladder that much worse, had left one small portion almost entirely dry… Well, not dry _yet_ of course. It had only been a few minutes.

The woman in black looked up at her, seemingly in the process of resting her arms, and gave her a kind of… _shrug._

“Slow going?”

There was a sigh, and then… “Listen. I’m trying to focus so that I _don’t_ slip and fall. I’d much rather you _not_ distract me while I’m preparing for the next leg of this.”

“Oh.”

Her voice was light, surprisingly so for a figure who had given them such a fright, and the cadence with which she spoke seemed practiced and even.

Alya stepped back, and then…

“I don’t suppose you know how long it’ll take?”

She looked up, and her eyes _flashed_ slightly in the now quite bright sky.

“If you’re in _that much_ of a hurry, you could try helping me up. I wouldn’t turn down a rope, or if there are trees up there, long branch, maybe? Or, of course, if you could block the flow again…”

Alya looked behind her.

“Nothing I can do about the water; the boulder’s a bit heavy for me. As for the rope… Well, I’ve _got_ rope, but I'm not sure you'd trust me.”

“Oh?”

“Well, I'm only waiting around to kill you.”

The woman gave her a look that was more confused than anything, and then shook her head.

“Well, that does put a damper on our relationship.”

There was a long silence.

“I mean…” said Alya, and considered it. “I promise I will _not_ kill you until you reach the top.”

“And who would complain if you _broke_ that promise? You’ll just have to wait_._”

Alya groaned. “I hate waiting. I could give you my word as an honest woman?”

“There’s a funny thing about _dishonest_ people.”

Alya nodded her head side to side. She wasn't wrong.

“So… There's no way you’ll trust me?”

“Not unless you’ve got some qualification I can rely on, which, frankly, seems unlikely, in the circumstances.”

A long second passed, marked only by the slow, even breathing of the woman below.

The fingers of Alya’s hand twitched, slightly, at her side, and she nodded slowly, coming to a resolution.

“I swear on what remains of my father; I will not let you fall.”

She stared evenly down at her soon-to-be enemy.

Neither of them said a word, until...

“Throw me the rope.”

She nodded, solemnly, and wend for her pack, and went for her pack.

20, 30 seconds pass in measured silence, as Alya knotted the rope around the same boulder that they used to block the water before, and carefully checked and rechecked her knots.

Good.

A viewer below would have seen, and in fact _did_ see, from on high, a coil of rope fly almost majestically over the edge.

It landed near the woman, who, after a moment’s hesitation, and looking back up at the _curtain_ of water she’d have to climb through, reached out, and took hold of it with one hand.

She pulled, and felt a reassuring _tug _from the other end.

She reached up the other hand, and started climbing, her feet still in the rungs of the ladder.

One step, two steps, three, and…

She was at the edge of the water, the rungs too far away to keep her feet secured.

She looked up, grimaced, and made her choice.

She let go of the wall.

­As Alya felt the weight on the rope increase, she began to pull, feeling, for the first time since she’d started climbing that _awful_ waterfall, actually _excited._

Seconds passed, yes, and long ones at that, but so many fewer than if she hadn’t had the rope.

Finally, the woman in black made it to the top, and clambered up.

She staggered, slightly, and started pushing against the current, still pulling on the rope.

The distance was smaller, smaller, until, finally, Alya was able to reach out a hand, and pull her up onto the relatively dry land.

For a second, they were almost uncomfortably close to each other, and then Alya took a long step back, to give her a bit more space.

“Thank you,” she said nodding softly.

She took in a deep breath, and straightened up unsteadily, reaching her hand down to her hip, where a baton waited.

_“Ah, _no, no, wait until you’re ready,” said Alya, waving the gesture off.

She let the baton go, sitting down lightly on the boulder, which was still poking out of the surface of the water.

“Again, thank you.”

She stretched out, slightly, almost catlike, and started wringing out her hair.

Alya stared at her, evenly, and let out a light ‘Hm.’

The woman looked back at her, the question on her face.

“Sorry. Just thinking… You wouldn’t happen to have Miraculous that looks like a fan, would you?”

“Do you start all your conversations that way?”

“Well, I would normally just see if your skin was blue, but… You strike me as the type who might have more than one Miraculous.”

A second passed.

“That didn’t explain anything, did it?”

The top portion of the braid now mostly dried, the woman shook her head.

“My father lost his humanity to a woman with a fan-shaped Miraculous, and… Blue skin.”

She sighed.

“My family has, for a long time, been the keeper of a remarkably powerful Miraculous. It’s one of the things that we take the most pride in, though we generally try to keep it quiet. I don’t know how she found out, but this _woman_ showed up one day and started bargaining. My father told her, maybe a dozen times, that it wasn’t for sale, but she kept insisting, and then…”

Alya shook her head. “I guess she finally realized that he wasn’t going to tell her so… She used her Miraculous on him, and… I don’t know what she did _exactly_, but he turned into a monster.”

Alya paced, seemingly almost like a caged animal herself.

“I told her to fix it, and save him. She refused. I tried to fight her, and…” She stood, silently, and the tension dropped from her shoulders. “I lost. She left me my humanity, but…”

She looked down, seemingly staring at the palm of her own hand…

There was certainly something wrong; some strange bent to the knuckles, and the nails too thick and too sharp.

“How old were you?”

Alya laughed, bitterly. “This was 4, 5 years ago, maybe. If she’d asked me for the Miraculous, told me she’d save my father in exchange for it, I’d probably have told her, but… I guess she didn’t think I’d know.”

She straightened. “I did, though, and I’m going to bring it to her." She shook her head. "I’m not going to let her have it, though; she doesn't deserve it. No, I'm going to walk up to the woman with the blue skin and say… ‘Hello. My name is Alya Cesaire. You cost me my father. I want him back.’”

“And you left your father behind for this?”

“To save him? Of course. He’d be fine in the woods, and my family is looking after him anyway_._ Probably for the best they were away that day."

"The only problem, of course, is that after five years, I’m starting to miss home, and I’m starting to wonder if I’m ever going to _find_ her. I’m just working for Lila since it gets me around, and keeps me fed.”

“Well, I certainly hope you find him,” said the woman, finally releasing her braid, and standing, “you seem more honorable than your business.”

“So, you’re ready then?”

“Whether I am or not, you’ve been more than fair.”

Alya bounced lightly away to a more… secure, starting distance, and turned to face her opponent brandishing that strange pipe that seemed part of her outfit, and her clawed hand.

“You seem like a perfectly decent woman. I’d hate to kill you.”

She shrugged, with the air of one who saw no way around the proposition.

“I feel much the same about you; I’d hate to die.”

They waited a second more, but there seemed nothing left to say.

“Then I suppose we should begin,” said Alya.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's an interesting thing when you're doing a story like this; on the one hand, you don't want it to just be that the names are swapped, but everything else is the same, but on the other, the lines from the original story are perfectly good on their own.


	6. The Duel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alya goes head to head with the mysterious stranger.

The woman in black reached down to the same baton she’d put her hand on earlier.

As she pulled it out, it grew in size, a bit longer than she was tall, and she gave it a gentle spin, before bringing it to face Alya.

“You know,” said Alya, lightly, twirling the baton in her own hand, “I’ve got to admit, I’m actually kind of jealous. _Mine_ doesn’t do that.”

She shrugged, and lightly stepped a bit closer.

“That’s Miraculouses for you.”

The staff twitched, a motion that would have seemed almost a nervous tic to someone else, but to Alya, it was ample cause to shift her stance slightly.

A second passed, and Alya stretched her hand out slightly at her side, visibly itching for an opening, but loathe to make the first move against an opponent with greater reach.

The woman’s eyes, for an instant, flicked to the path forward, and she seemed to remember that her quarry was steadily getting further away.

In a blur, the back end of the staff came for Alya’s head, and as she ducked under it, battle was joined.

The staff came back, but seemed to bounce off of nothing as Alya put a hand up to catch it, but that didn’t stop Alya from following the motion she’d begun, spinning around, and violently lashing out with the baton.

It only met air, though, as the woman popped back, arching herself out of the way. The staff, already in the air, came down horizontally with a mighty force, but Alya, with an almost inhuman grace, snaked back from it, and jabbed at her enemy’s neck with her baton.

The woman jerked to the side, the baton grazing lightly along her neck, and struck _upwards_ with her staff.

The blow landed easily in Alya’s palm, but as she tried to take hold of the staff, it was jerked away, and flipped almost impossibly around the woman’s back, and came back from the other side.

Alya barely managed to block the strike with her baton, and as the back end of the staff came up, she staggered to the side, and barely managed to leap away as what would have been a decisive _stab_ came for her.

She landed on her back, but managed to turn it into a rolling _spring,_ landing three stones back with her baton up.

“You’re relying on dazzling me with fancy maneuvers, then?”

“Not relying,” she said, already upon her again, “just obscuring my movements to give you a wider angle to block from.”

“Naturally,” agreed Alya, the baton twirling easily to block three short strikes, “I guess that’s your way of handling the fact that your weapon’s a bit more cumbersome.”

“Well,” she said, and suddenly the baton had met a match, in a deadly black, “I find I have built in solution to that.”

The tempo of the battle increasing as the weapons grew more agile, Alya managed to match her, the batons clashing like a pair of drumsticks.

“It’s not so much a solution,” she said, “because if we’re matched with our weapons, then it comes down to who has the more dangerous hands.

She _slashed_ out.

“Which I win.”

She pushed forward, finally forcing the woman into a retreat, and leaped forward, into a sudden switch back to the staff, which she only _narrowly_ managed to avoid jumping straight into.

At that near stumble, the battle shifted back again, and suddenly it was _Alya_ retreating, the staff swinging dizzyingly near her, as she dodged breathtakingly close.

A step back, a step back, a push forward, and suddenly it was the baton again, still evenly matched in all ways but the claws on her hand, which she just couldn’t seem to make contact with.

One more push, and the sound of rushing water rose up behind her.

Alya grinned, her breathing becoming ragged, but her spirit soaring.

“You are _wonderful_.”

“Thank you,” the baton caught a strike from the staff. “I’ve worked hard to become so.”

One more stone back, and the falls were very close now.

“I must admit it, you are better than I am.”

She almost fell as the staff came dizzyingly close to her face.

“Then why are you smiling?”

“Well,” said Alya, “you remember how I said my family had a powerful miraculous?”

“Of course.”

“I’m afraid I have to show you what I meant.”

And, buying herself the last bit of space she had, she leaped back onto the boulder that had blocked the flow before, and the arm holding the baton _jerked_ outwards, the motion producing a strange hum, and making the air ripple like it was under intense heat.

The woman had no intention of letting Alya do anything so easily, pushing forward, but her strike landed almost a foot to the right of where Alya was standing, and Alya had the baton… the… _flute,_ up to her lips.

As she managed to get a strike in the right general vicinity, Alya leapt the final inches to the stonework around the trough that carried the water, a twisting, dizzying melody making the ripples in the air almost incomprehensible. Alya’s form was torn asunder and reconstituted like nothing more than a reflection in turbulent water.

She stepped back, seemingly unsure how to react, and then Alya was on the offensive.

If it had been an even match before, it wasn’t now, as Alya was seemingly untouchable, by all but the luckiest of shots, and even then, her reactions were still just as good, seemingly unaffected by the mirage she’d whipped up.

The woman jumped back, two stones, four stones, seven, and as Alya lightly stepped to the side she backed away again, realizing too late that she’d been herded onto the pillars of the old bridge.

As Alya followed her up, she spun a strike around, more strength than skill, and though it made contact, seeming to twist in the air to have the chance, it glanced off as Alya gave it a bare _twitch_.

She retreated again, switched to the baton, and found nothing but a slash that made weak, but unnerving contact with her stomach.

One more jump, and she was out of pillars, the next one cracked into a jagged mess of stone, that would surely lacerate her and send her into the water.

Alya jumped forward, and found her last stand, a vicious onslaught of blind strikes.

“Anyone would be wise to fear you,” said the woman.

Alya grinned, though the nuance was lost through the haze, “My father had good reason to refuse her offers.”

The baton twisted, and she staggered at what was almost a punch to the gut.

“There’s something I ought to tell you,” she said, straining to speak as her lungs were forgetting how to breathe.

“Tell me,” said Alya, and she knew that it was only courtesy that kept her alive.

She looked up.

_“My miraculous is powerful, too.”_

Her hand clenched, the ring, that Alya had barely paid attention to, sparking like lightning. She stood, staff coming up like a bolt of lightning, and Alya barely stepped out of the way, as the crackling sound seemed to cut through the mirage, ripping it apart like a cobweb.

She pressed forward, stabbing at her in the hopes she hadn’t recovered her balance yet, but the black baton came up, and she gasped in pain at there was a _pop_ of energy, and her baton flew from her hand, up and back.

She slashed, and retreated, back a pillar, and dove to the edge because… The baton had been just above the water’s surface, but she’d recovered it_._

She pulled herself, unsteadily, to her feet, and saw the woman in black grin.

She _winked,_ and threw her baton _up,_ and it spun, up, up, and-

She leaped, and _snagged_ it out of the air, and as she came down, it was the staff in her hand again.

“Now you’re just showing off,” said Alya, smiling as she shook her head in confusion.

“Maybe,” she said, smiling.

And the fight continued, the moves coming too quickly to tell.

Every swipe Alya made brought back a bit of that fog, and every response cut it away.

As Alya fought, straining the limits of her capabilities, she realized, horribly, that this was the cards on the table; she was out of tricks, and she was still falling back, with every block coming at a cost as that strange energy stabbed like lightning through the flute.

She could fight, even stall, but she was falling back, slowly… Slowly.

And then, her foot hit dirt instead of stone, and as she registered the fact, she must have turned, hesitated, shown _some_ sign of weakness, because…

The baton was suddenly the staff again, and jabbed into her stomach.

The crackling force _popped,_ and she staggered back, dazed.

One good strike, and the flute flew from her hand, bouncing away onto the ground.

A light tap on her shoulder brought her to her knees.

She stopped, dead, breathing heavily.

She closed her eyes.

“Who… Who are you?” she asked.

“Nobody you’d have heard of.”

She looked up again.

“Please. It’s not like… Not like I’ll ever have a chance to use it against you.”

To her surprise, the other woman tilted her head, slightly, and smiled at her.

“I’d sooner destroy my Miraculous than tarnish a goal as noble as yours by killing you,” she said, laying her right hand lightly on Alya’s shoulder.

Alya met her eye, and was almost surprised to find an honest compassion there.

Then, her vision started to fade, that same lightning filling her mind, almost gently.

“Still,” she said, her voice coming from further and further away, “since I can’t have you following me…”

And then…

As the woman… _Alya,_ slumped, she stood up.

“You should be fine in an hour or so,” she said, as she walked away, though she knew that Alya was in no position to register the words. “Please, understand that I have the utmost respect for you.”

Then, with a breath to recenter herself, she ran on.


	7. Sportsmanlike

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Woman in Black fights onwards, coming up against what seems to be an immovable object, in more ways than one.

_“Inconceivable.”_

Nino looked over her shoulder, and raised his eyebrows at the sight of a figure in black, following them below.

“_Okay. Right, hand me the rope.”_

Nino, as requested, handed over the end of the cord that he had earlier tied around Adrien’s wrists, and was surprised as Lila started walking away.

“Catch up with us quickly.”

“Wait, what am I doing?”

Lila scoffed, not even bothering to turn. “_Finish_ her. _Your _way.”

“Oh, okay. Gotcha…”

Lila started walking away again.

“Which way’s _my_ way?”

She stopped, rounding on him.

“Do I have to do _everything_? You have a powerful miraculous, this should be _easy._ Just…” she gestured at an overpass of stone, “stay out of sight. In a few minutes the woman in black will come around the corner. The minute she shows herself, _drop a pile of rocks on her.”_

And with that, she seemed satisfied, and walked away, with Adrien in tow.

Nino watched her go.

“I didn’t know _‘my way’_ was so… unsportsmanlike.”

\--

She stepped lightly up the stairs, her legs still strong, despite the fact that she’d been climbing for the better part of an hour.

And then, finally, she was at the top.

Now…

The fact that they had a hostage had to be slowing them down … Hopefully, that would mean she was getting close, now.

More to the point, if they’d been confident that their champion would win (as they have had every right to be), maybe even stopped to eat, and if they had, it would probably be about _here._

She walked silently, now, listening for any sign of them.

But… No voices. No footfalls. No crackling of a cooking fire.

She took a deep breath, and started forward again.

She couldn’t have gone more than a few steps when there was an unnatural, almost _musical_ sound around her, and the air turned… _green?_

As her eyes focused on it, she realized that she was staring through a glassy shell that, even as she looked, seemed to spread out around her.

Then, as it pushed _upwards,_ she heard something unnerving above her, and…

“How’re you doing, dude?”

She looked away from the unstable overpass above her, and down at…

He was smiling, and not in a proud way, or anything like… he just… Seemed genuinely at peace in the situation.

She glanced upwards. “Fine, thanks…”

He nodded, gently.

“Guess you beat Alya, then. Pretty impressive.”

Distressingly aware of how tenuous her continued survival was, she tried to restrain the persistent twitch in her fingers.

“She fought well.”

“Mm… I’m assuming she didn’t use her Miraculous, though.”

“No, she did.”

“And you still won?”

She shrugged as if to suggest that her presence should imply enough.

“Impressive, dude.”

“Like I said; she fought well.”

“Just for my reference; her family’s gonna want her Miraculous back, so is that like in one of your pockets, or…?”

“I’m not a thief.”

He tilted his head slightly.

“Thief as in… She’s still alive?”

“She had ample opportunity to kill me before, and decided not to; I’d consider it a fair exchange.”

He laughed. “Sounds like Alya, yeah.”

There was a long silence.

Eventually, she had to speak.

“Not that I’m particularly… _excited_ to find out, but I do have places to be, so… What happens now?”

“Oh!” said Nino, as if he’d forgotten himself. “Now, I think, we fight each other properly. No special abilities, no weapons… Just skill against skill.”

“You mean… We detransform and try to kill each other like civilized people?”

“Well… I figure you’re not wearing that mask when you’re detransformed, so maybe we keep the Miraculouses on, but otherwise, we’d basically be pretending that we didn’t have them.”

She sized him up.

He was bigger, probably stronger, and certainly better armored than her.

He shrugged, and gestured lightly above her. “I could kill you now.”

She put up her hands, the baton held lightly.

“Frankly, I think the odds are slightly in your favor at hand fighting.”

The barrier in front of her rippled, and then simply _wasn’t_ there.

She stepped lightly forward, until she was maybe 20 feet from him, and tossed the baton aside.

He nodded, matching the motion with his shield.

“Well, if you’re okay with just ditching the Miraculouses entirely…”

She sighed. “I think it would be even _more_ in your favor at that point.”

He shrugged, and there was a tremendous rumbling of stone behind her, as the barrier vanished.

A long moment passed as they waited for things to settle down.

“Y’know, though, it’s not really my fault being all big and strong. Not like I had to _exercise_ to look like this.”

There was a second’s pause, and then…

She sprang forward, and leveled her most savage punch at his face.

He raised his eyebrows, and batted the attack aside.

She came back with a pair of punches to the gut, which barely seemed to faze him.

She slipped to the side, hoping that if she twisted his arm, properly, that maybe…

“Are you just messing with me, or what?”

“I just want to feel like you’re doing well, dude. It’s bad enough that you might end up dead, but embarrassed too? It just feels like it would be a bit much.”

But, that said, he finally brought his arms up and-

She stepped lightly back as he tried to grab, ably sidestepped a punch that could have laid her flat, and slipped behind him, pulling away as he turned around.

He whistled, softly.

“Okay, so you’re _real_ quick.”

“I’d certainly hope so.”

He seemed to be sizing her up, trying to get a lock on her.

“So,” he said, more conversationally than anything, “why the mask? Like, is it a medical thing, or… An acid burn, maybe?”

Pulling away from the large, sweeping strikes he was sending at her, she backed away.

“It’s actually surprisingly comfortable,” she said, narrowly avoiding a grapple that could have spelled her death. “Considering the fact that you’re in the process of kidnapping someone, I’m surprised you and Alya aren’t using them.”

He shrugged as if the idea hadn’t especially occurred to him, and came after her again.

He was faster this time, and he hadn’t been slow to begin with.

She dodged, once, twice, three times, and then…

It clicked.

In a dizzying blur, she spun, as if in some precise dance, and she was behind him again, and-

Her arm was, in an instant, locked, vice-like, around his throat.

He let out a choked sound, but she could feel the muscles in his throat locking up, struggling to keep him breathing.

“You know,” he said, flailing at her head, but not managing to get a useable angle, “I think I’m starting to get why you’re giving me so much trouble.”

“Oh,” she said, before the air was forced from her lungs by an elbow straight to her stomach. _“Why is that,”_ she narrowly avoided another elbow, _‘do you think?”_

He clawed, fruitlessly at the arm, and managed another savage blow to her stomach.

_“Well, I’ve gotten so used to fighting groups,” _he wheezed, _“that it’s gotten way harder to fight one-on-one.”_

“Well, why should that make such a—” Her eyes widened as they both fell backwards, and he landed like a ton of bricks on her. _“Difference.”_

Her arm around his neck loosened, for an instant, but she managed to keep the hold, and she knew that she was feeling weakness now; his breathing was weaker than before.

She retightened the grip.

“I think…” he said, and scrabbled with his feet, trying to pull his body up, “that it comes down to the way that groups have trouble moving all at once.”

He managed a bit of height, and brought his full weight down on her again.

“Which… Which you don’t.”

He was pulling upwards again, but his breathing was only wheezing, now, and…

One more drop, but it had only worked at first because he’d been on his feet and dropped the whole distance.

His hands were pulling at her arms, scraping, weaker, weaker, and…

He stopped moving.

She loosened her grip, half expecting a trick, but…

She lightly slid him off of her, and groaned her way to her knees.

He lay there, mouth hanging open.

Now…

She leaned down, and placed an ear to his chest.

Belabored, weak, but… The air was flowing, and his heart was beating.

She stood the rest of the way up.

“Well,” she said, “I don’t envy the headache you’ll have when you wake up, but… In the meantime, rest well, and dream of…” for an instant, she glanced back the way she’d come from. She shrugged. “I’m sure you’d know better than I would.”

Her back crackled, a trifle unnervingly, as she stretched it out, but her injuries were nothing that wouldn’t heal, and she still had somewhere to be.

She picked up her baton, left the shield by Nino’s side, and started running again, ignoring the ache in her chest.


	8. A Battle of Wits

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gabriel Agreste is on the trail of his son, but he won't get to him first.

To the wrong eye, the scene was… uninteresting. The ground was water and bare stone; hardly anything that should have given valuable information.

But a beast could smell its quarry, and he…

He could see trails of emotion, fading away as the time had passed, but still visible to someone with the right Miraculous. And yet…

“I would almost guess that they were friends, glad to meet each other,” he said, frowning. “And yet the path suggests a fight between two masters of the craft, each putting forth their greatest efforts.”

“And how did it end?”

He straightened up, and turned to the search party he had assembled, and, more specifically, to Nathalie, whose deadpan expression suggested that this was nothing more than business to her, just as he liked it.

“The loser ran off alone, recently, and the winner—" he pointed to the path that led up into the mountain path, “—Followed the oldest trace, into the Gilded Kingdom’s frontier.”

“Shall we track them both?”

He shook his head. “The loser is of no importance anymore. All that matters here is the safe retrieval of Adrien.” He turned to the assembled warriors that made up the search party.

“It disturbs me that his kidnappers would bring him to the Gilded Kingdom. We must be prepared for whatever lies ahead.”

“Do you mean a trap, sir?”

“I am eternally preparing myself for traps,” he said, coming to his feet. “I wouldn’t be alive otherwise.”

He caught the nervous glances between members of the entourage.

He turned to them.

“Rest assured, given even the barest instant of warning—” and at that, he flexed his fingers, and glimmering white shapes were for a moment visible, moving as if alive, “—I will not hesitate to make you the equals of any challenge.”

He met their eyes in turn, and was pleased to see them relax, slightly.

_Good. There was every chance of a war, and his best chance of victory lay in being a leader that could rally his soldiers._

_Until then, though, it was time to retrieve his son._

It felt as if she’d been climbing for _hours,_ even though it couldn’t have been much longer than 45 minutes, and she had _finally_ made it to the peak of the mountain.

And there…

Two people sat on the other side of a… _table? _A large stone, with a tablecloth? Having a picnic?

Then her eyes focused properly, and she realized that although there was a fine selection of food, this was no picnic.

Because Adrien, and it was certainly Adrien, had a knife to his throat, and a blindfold across his eyes.

She slowed to a bare walk.

The woman holding the knife studied her, smiling lightly. Judging by her clothes, she wasn’t even using a Miraculous, but… She had a hostage.

“So,” she said, when they were finally close enough together, “it is down to you, and it is down to me.”

She nodded, and took a step forward.

“Oh, by all means, if you want him dead, keep coming.”

The knife came a little bit closer to Adrien’s neck.

“Let me explain.”

“There’s nothing to explain. You’re trying to kidnap what I’ve rightfully stolen.”

“Maybe we can reach an arrangement.”

“There will be no ‘arrangement,’ _and you’re killing him.”_

She stopped dead, and a long second passed.

She frowned. “But if we can’t reach an arrangement, then we’re at an impasse.”

Lila, for this had to be the ‘Lila’ she’d heard about, shrugged.

“I’m afraid so. I can’t possibly beat you physically, and you’re no match for my brains.”

She raised her eyebrows. “No match? You’re that smart?”

She grinned. “A woman doesn’t need a _miraculous_ to be something special. Why do you think I didn’t take one for myself?”

She took a deep breath.

“Well… In that case, I only see one way forward. I challenge you to a battle of wits.”

Lila’s smile, which had faded, widened again. “For _him,”_ she jabbed the knife unnervingly close to Adrien.

She nodded.

“To the death?”

Another nod.

“I accept.”

“Good. Then do you have anything to fill those cups with?”

Lila reached down, pulled up a small skin, and poured what must have been wine.

She nodded slowly, and then closed her eyes as if thinking.

“Do I have…” She smiled, and turned away, producing as she turned back…

“I do,” she said, holding a small, twisted packet in one hand.

“Have you ever heard of… Iocane powder?”

Lila tilted her head slightly.

“I have.”

“I trust you know its properties? Odorless, tasteless, dissolves instantly in most liquids. An especially _deadly_ poison.”

“I’ve used it once or twice,” said Lila, “you recall the assassination of Prince Himperdunk, from a few years ago? I was speaking to him as his drink was being poisoned with it.”

“I heard it was done with arsenic.”

She shrugged. “You must have misheard.”

“I suppose I must have,” she said, taking ahold of the goblets Lila had filled.

She turned, and a few seconds passed.

When she turned back, the packet was gone, and she slowly, carefully, offered one, then the other, to Lila, before finally putting one in front of each of them.

“Alright then. Where is the poison? The battle of wits has begun.”

“That’s it?” said Lila, eyebrows raised. “But it’s so simple. All I have to do is divine from what I know of you; are you the sort of woman who would put the poison into her own goblet, or her enemy’s?”

She shrugged. “Now, if you were wise, you would put the poison into your own wine, knowing only a great fool would immediately accept the wine given to them. I of course, am not a great fool, so I cannot accept the wine in front of me.”

She nodded, lightly, at Lila’s reasoning.

“But on the other hand, you already _know_ that I’m not a great fool. You would have _counted_ on it! So, of course, I can’t choose the wine in front of you.”

Her expression was stoic. “Then you’ve made your choice?”

“Not remotely! Because Iocane comes from Australia, as everyone knows, and Australia is entirely peopled with criminals. Criminals, of course, are used to not having anyone trust them, as you are not trusted by me, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me.”

“You’re starting to lose me.”

“Wait ‘til I get going!” Lila blinked. “Where was I?”

“Australia.”

“Ah yes. And, of course, you must have suspected I would know the poison’s origin, so I can clearly not choose the wine in front of me.”

She leaned back.

“You’re just stalling.”

_“You’d like to think that, wouldn’t you!”_ she said, eyes flaring. She seemed to be trying to bore a hole through her opponent at this point.

“You’ve beaten both of my champions. One of them was strong, so to beat him, you must have been stronger, meaning that you might be counting on your _strength_ to save you. Clearly, then, I cannot choose the wine in front of you. _But!_ The other was precise and skillful, and to beat her, you must have been even more precise and skillful, which means you would be intimately aware with the fragility of mortality, so you would put the poison as _far _from yourself as possible, meaning that I _clearly_ cannot choose the wine in front of me.”

Her expression, still stoic, now seemed to almost be sinking into displeasure.

“You’re trying to trick me into giving something away. It won’t work.”

Lila opened her mouth, to begin another tirade, and then froze.

Slowly, she sat back in her spot, and the grin spread across her face.

“You’re wrong. It _has_ worked. You’ve given _everything_ away. You gave it away before this battle even _started._”

“_Then make your choice.”_

“Oh, oh I have.” She reached down for the cup in front of her, and raised it up.

“Adrien? Open your mouth.”

Lila stared smugly at her opponent, whose expression was still blank, but different; it was a _frozen_ blank.

Adrien seemed unwilling to do so, but she put up a hand, applied a little pressure, and… his jaw fell open, just enough to allow—

“Wait!”

Lila turned her attention away from Adrien.

“Yes?”

She gestured at the cup.

“Oh, would you prefer we switch?” Lila tilted her head side to side, and then smiled, switching the positions of the cups. “Well then, by all means. I like to consider myself a _generous_ woman.”

She took the other cup.

“Then lets drink. Me from my glass, and you, from yours.”

Her hand was shaking on the goblet that Adrien had been about to drink from, Lila’s smile boring a hole in her self-control.

She clenched her hand, and then, in a single motion, downed the contents of the glass.

Lila matched the motion, a trifle more discreet.

A second passed.

“Well then,” said Lila, “do you want to know what your mistake was, before you die?”

“Tell me.”

“You made it clear you cared about him. Every move you made was calculated to avoid even the slightest bit of harm to him, which _means,_ the instant I threatened him, you’d have to panic. I know real fear when I see it, and you were _afraid_ of him drinking from that cup.”

She paused, grinning widely.

“But really, you fell for the most obvious blunder of all. The most famous, of course, is to never get involved in a land war in Asia, but only _slightly less known_ is this,” she spread her arms out exultantly, “never go in against a Sicilian, when _death_ is on the line.”

She laughed, the sound starting as a mild chuckle, and then growing, almost maniacal, the laugh of a woman who had been pushed to the wall, but had come back for a glorious victory.

And then, there was a crackling sound, and her eyes widened for a bare instant, before glazing over.

She crumpled in on herself, crumbling to dust before the woman in black’s eyes.

She smiled, and then bent over slightly, letting out a quiet groan.

Then, with an effort, she straightened, and went to Adrien.

She removed the blindfold.

Adrien blinked, as she stared carefully into his eyes, and then she nodded.

He looked over at the remains of Lila, and his eyes widened.

“Who are you?”

“I am no one to be trifled with. That’s all you need to know for now.”

She pulled him upright, removing the bindings from his hands as she did so.

He looked back from her at the pile of dust that had been Lila.

“I’ve never heard of Iocane powder. I’ve never heard of _any_ poison that could do that to a person.”

She laughed. “Iocane powder is an old poisoner’s myth, a useful shorthand for something supposedly untraceable”

“Then… What killed her? There must have been _some_ poison, or…” He shook his head. “To think; she thought she saw real fear, but the whole time, the _real_ danger was the other drink.”

“She would have died whichever she drank from,” said the woman in black. “and so would you.”

“But… But _you drank from it! _Did you… Build up an immunity or something?”

“You’re closer than you might think.”

She pulled him along after her.

“It took me years to really _understand_ the versatility of this Miraculous, but I eventually discovered a strange quirk; I can disintegrate whatever I touch, but water, or… _wine,_ are already disintegrated. The water insulates the effects until, for whatever reason, it is ingested, or evaporated. Those goblets are likely pitted beyond use by now, and you saw what happened to Lila, but the worst I’ll face is stomach pain.”

Adrien looked back at where Lila had been, and there was a sinking sensation in his guts.

Lila had been bad enough.

This woman… She didn’t have the blustering, boasting Lila had had, or Nino’s relaxed nature, or even Alya’s sharp tongue.

She was pure business, and that scared him.

It felt as if he’d been taken from kidnappers, and given to an _assassin_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I mean, if Chat Noir can hold a cataclysm in his hand, then presumably there's *some* inherent resistance that comes with the territory.
> 
> More to the point, it seemed a waste to have the person with an instant kill ability never use it.


	9. 'If You Want, I Can Fly'

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With Gabriel in hot pursuit, Adrien makes, in quick succession, two major discoveries.

By the time they finally stopped for a moment, Adrien felt like his lungs were going to burst.

The woman in black, letting him go, still stood tall, her practiced ease from her confrontation with Lila seemingly replaced with nervous, almost animal energy.

_“Catch your breath,”_ she said, voice devoid of patience, and… Whatever it was he’d seen in her eyes for an instant when she’d removed the blindfold.

“If you release me,” he said, pulling in a breath, “whatever you ask for ransom… You’d get it, I promise you.”

Her fingers twitched at her side.

“And what power am I supposed to believe you hold, to deliver on that promise?”

He sighed, managing to straighten up. “I’m just trying to give you a chance. My father is practically inescapable, and if he doesn’t get you, then you’re running straight into the Gilded Kingdom’s frontier. They say Chloe herself carries her Miraculous out here to hunt with.”

“Ah, yes… _Chloe. _I recall the news. Then, you believe your dearest love will save you?”

“I never said she was my dearest love. But she would save me, if she found me.”

“You freely admit that you don’t your own fiancé?”

“She knows that I don’t love her.”

“Don’t, or aren’t _capable_ of it?”

Adrien’s fists clenched.

“You’re a _killer._ I don’t see how you can even _pretend_ to know more about love than me.”

She spun towards him, her hand suddenly burning with that strange energy, her eyes flaring green, and for a second, Adrien was sure he’d broken some internal barrier, and his life was forfeit.

And then, her eyes closed, her hand relaxed, and when she looked back at him, she seemed like an ordinary person again.

Her voice was steady as she spoke. “I suggest you avoid making assumptions. People who’ve suggested similar have rarely been glad of it.”

A mighty warrior had fallen, and that same person from the duel had continued on. That alone had been enough to unnerve him, but this… This was bad.

It looked like someone had stopped for lunch, and then immediately left.

He knelt down, and picked up one of the goblets.

It was ruined, the inside tarnished beyond repair, a hole having been burned through it.

That, combined with the raw pride and exultation coming from the pile of _ash…_

“Poison, then,” he said, straightening up, “of some untold power. But Adrien left this place alive at most an hour ago. We must find him, _now._”

He was beginning to grow nervous.

Once more they had stopped, and Adrien staggered, landing heavily on the ground, as she stared impassively at him.

“Rest.” 

She sounded almost tired herself, but moved rapidly, almost _nervously_ taking stock of their surroundings; the sheer ravine they were on the edge of, the winding hills they’d followed to get here.

He stared at her, and the idea he’d known he’d had since the battle of wits finally introduced itself.

His eyes widened.

_“I know who you are. _I _should_ have known sooner.”

She looked at him, but said nothing.

_“You’re the Nine-Lived One. _Admit it._”_

She shrugged, nodded gently. “Of course. What can I do for you?”

Adrien’s expression clenched.

“There’s nothing you _can_ do. The only thing that I can think of is for you to die.”

To his surprise, the vitriol seemed to settle her expression slightly, and her nervous movements slowed.

“Well, I must say, that’s more venomous than I’d have expected from you. What has you so angry at _me?_”

“You killed Marinette.”

She stared evenly at him, and shrugged.

“It’s possible; I kill a lot of people. Who _was_ this Marinette? Another princess like your _Chloe,_ or… Just a friend.”

“Neither. She was a baker’s daughter, poor, but… Better than I could ever have asked for, with an iron will, and eyes like a clear sky.”

His breath shook, slightly, but he maintained his composure.

“Out to sea, your ship attacked… She wasn’t the one you cut loose to spread fear.”

“Well, I can’t afford to let the ‘best’ person go. If word leaks out that a pirate’s letting people go based on morality, people start to practice morality as a defense and then you’re stuck with dozens of people with strong wills, and you can’t find a new host for when the old one’s too old, and you’re having to measure morality while you’re executing people, and it just bogs everything down, and it’s _work, work, work”_

“I should have known you’d have no respect for another’s pain,” said Adrien.

“My life has been nothing _but_ pain for _years._ Frankly, I think a lack of empathy might be a side-effect.”

There was a moment.

“But… I do believe I recall the girl you’re talking about. This would be… Five years ago?”

He nodded.

“She died well, which should please you. She didn’t offer a bribe, though that’s no surprise if she truly _was_ poor. No blubbering, or anything like that. All she said was…” She looked back at Adrien, expression thoughtful. “_Please._ _Please, I need to live. _I think that’s what caught my memory. She was shaking, but she didn’t panic._”_

Then, she was back to normal. “I asked her what was so important for her. ‘True love,’ she said, and spoke of a boy worth any effort it would take to appease his father. Surpassingly beautiful and faithful.” She shrugged. “I can only assume she meant you, but… It’s probably for the best that I killed her.”

_“Why.”_

_Really?_ The woman in black seemed to ask without speaking. “Faithfulness. She was so sure of it, but really, tell the truth, did you manage to move on the day you heard about her death, or did it take you a whole week of mourning?”

_ “You just told me how dangerous it is to make assumptions about people,”_ said Adrien, pushing to his feet. “It would have been less painful if you’d cut out my heart. At least then I’d be dead.”

The woman in black seemed about to respond, before something caught her eye. There was a cloud of dust in the distance, such as might have been kicked up by a search party coming closer.

“I might even get to see her again,” said Adrien, voice weak.

Then, he clenched his fists, not noticing the tension drop from her body as she listened.

“And if you really _do_ understand how I feel, then this is doing us _both_ a favor.”

“Adrien,” she said, turning, but before he managed to process his own name, he’d already pushed her.

She staggered backwards, eyes going wide as she realized what had happened.

_“Wait,” _she managed, arms spinning wildly as her foot slipped just over the edge of the ravine, _“Wait wait wait wait waaii—”_

She let out a high-pitched yelp as she finally fell over the edge, which trailed away from him as she fell, _down, down, down._

He blinked.

That… No.

He’d have sworn that he knew that particular sound of panic, because…

_What was it they said? The Nine-Lived One wasn’t just a person; It was a malevolent Miraculous that possessed its wielder._

Which meant…

_“Marinette,” _he said, and threw himself over the edge after her.

_He could still save her, if he could just get that ring off._

Gabriel’s fists clenched.

_“Disappeared,”_ he looked back. “His captor must have spotted us closing in; that would explain the panicked choice, because unless I am wrong, and I am _never_ wrong, they are aimed directly at the Fire Swamp.”

Nathalie’s eyes widened slightly at the name, the first sign of any emotion since they’d set out.

As Marinette fell, she tried, to the best of her ability, to both process what had just happened, and stop herself getting hurt by the fall.

Neither was exactly _easy,_ but she managed to do the second first, landing at the bottom of the ravine.

She looked back up, and her eyes widened.

Adrien was clearly trying to control his descent, but it wasn’t working very well, as he started rolling, rather than scrambling his way down.

She pulled to her feet, as he finally reached the last drop, and _dove,_ managing to cushion the impact slightly.

The was a long, painful pause, as he shifted slightly, clearly trying to get his bearings.

“Adrien,” she started, only for him to suddenly, with a force that surprised her, start grasping out, reaching forcefully at… _her hand?_

More baffled than anything, she effortlessly knocked his hands away.

He kept coming, and with the gentle expertise that was hardly possible without superhuman capabilities, she reached out, and pinned his hands behind his back with one of hers.

_“A- Adrien,”_ she repeated, fighting the stutter that was trying to resurface, as he kept flailing out, now with his head, _“What are you—”_

_“Let her go,”_ said Adrien.

“Let _who_ go? Adrien, please, _stop_ it.”

He was getting frantic, now, struggling with all his might, and…

She finally remembered the myth about her Miraculous.

“Oh. Adrien, no.”

She tilted her head, as if lightly knocking something away.

Adrien froze, as her clothes shimmered, lightly, and the woman in black was no longer in black.

It was as if he was looking through a window into the past.

Her clothes were just as he remembered them. Her hair was longer but her _eyes. _It was the same sparkling blue he’d known years before, and it felt like he was melting.

_“Then… Then it’s really you.”_

He was staring as if he thought she might evaporate.

“Are you okay, Adrien?”

He laughed, almost choking, his eyes shining.

_“You’re alive._ _I couldn’t be better.”_

“I told you I’d always come for you. Why didn’t you wait?”

“You… You were dead.”

She sighed, leaning in a bit closer. “Death can’t stop love. The most it can do is delay it for a while.”

He was starting to cry, now. “I’ll never doubt you again.”

“You’ll never need to,” she said, and leaned in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh boy, okay, um...  
So, that scene goes on for like 5 minutes and it's mostly descriptions of kissing and crying...
> 
> I'll skip on to the fire swamp.


	10. The Fire Swamp

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adrien and Marinette duck into the Fire Swamp to buy themselves time to talk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, okay, so we’re skipping forward to the fire swamp…  
So... Yeah, yeah, she leans in, they kiss like they haven’t seen each other for years, because they haven’t, blah blah…  
Adrien starts crying…  
Both of them are burning up because of the strength of their emotion…  
Adrien manages to kiss her back…  
Marinette starts crying too, because of course she does…  
A few more minutes of them just lying there crying and laughing...  
Wow. That is... Unnecessarily sappy.  
Okay, okay, here we go, we're getting close.  
Right, Marinette says something about how they need to get moving, Adrien wishes he could stay there forever, and…  
And?  
I forgot how long this scene was, but, okay, there we go. They finally stand up, and…

Adrien and Marinette raced along the ravine floor. Adrien hurriedly wiped his face dry.

At some prompting that was beyond Adrien, Marinette looked up.

“Your father’s too late. A few more steps, and we’ll be safely in the fire swamp.”

Adrien spun to her, stumbling to keep up.

_“Wait! Why are we still running? Surely if Father’s coming here to rescue me…”_

She shook her head. “There’s too much to explain before he gets here. We only need a few minutes.”

“But… We’d never survive!”

She grinned, with only a trace of nerves, and the suit rematerialized.

“You’re just saying that because no one ever has.”

And she walked in, pulling Adrien behind her, leaving Gabriel and his entourage in the distance, barely a cloud of dust.

Really, it didn’t look any worse than any other infernal horror you might run across.

The trees blocked out the sun, but…

“It’s not _that_ bad,” said Marinette, lightly twirling her baton. “Not that I’d like to live here, but we only need to get a few minutes distance before your _father_ won’t risk following us, and if that’s all it takes, then it’s not too bad to take a stroll in.”

Adrien, trying and failing to suppress his nerves, followed as closely as he could, holding onto her arm for what comfort it could give.

“Now,” she said, “this should be far enough, so—”

There was a popping noise, and then, from where it had come-

Marinette recoiled from a blast of fire, getting away unscathed.

Adrien, meanwhile…

Her eyes twitched to his left leg, which had gotten caught in the blast.

In an instant, even before he’d realized what had happened, she had Adrien sitting down on a log that protruded from a nearby tree, and was furiously extinguishing the fire.

An instant of frenzied motion, and…

He was put out.

Marinette, after a second, let her head rest against his shin.

“Well,” said Adrien. “That was… An adventure. I’m okay. You?”

She took a deep breath, and looked up at him, smiling.

“Fine. Just a bit of singeing that barely got through my gloves.”

She stood up, and there was another popping sound.

One quick step forward, and the flame missed her entirely.

“This place certainly keep you on your toes,” she said, leaning up against the same tree that was supporting Adrien.

A long second passed.

Marinette sighed.

“I think this whole thing is almost over. An arranged marriage is a hard thing to undo, but if you have a new prospective suitor, and a suitably strong reason not to refuse them, I believe it’s possible, and I’m rich, have a powerful miraculous, and I’m the captain of the Revenge, which is the most feared pirate ship currently at large.” 

“Oh, right, about that,” said Adrien, “I’ve always heard that that Miraculous takes control of its wearer.”

“So did I, but life’s strange like that,” said Marinette, sliding horizontally so that her shoulder pressed lightly against his head. “You see, what I told you about saying please was true. It intrigued Nine- Ah, the Nine-Lived One.” She shrugged. “Saying the whole title gets tedious after a while.”

She reached up a hand, and started absently disintegrating some flies that were buzzing a bit too close.

“Eventually, Nine decided something. He said, ‘Alright, Marinette, I’ve never had a valet. You can try it for tonight. I’ll most likely kill you in the morning.’ He spent three years saying that. ‘Good work, Marinette, sleep well, I’ll most likely kill you in the morning.’” She laughed. “Except for the fact that I wasn’t with you, it would have been a great time for me; Nine taught me how to fight with a staff or a baton, and I was learning… All sorts of things, really. Anything anyone would teach me. I even sewed a few of the crew members hats.”

“It took me a while to realize that I was actually kind of _friends_ with Nine. And it wasn’t long after…”

“What?”

“Nine took me to his cabin, and shut the doors. Then… He did something that shouldn’t have been possible. He detransformed, and laid the ring on the table. Then, he told me his secret. ‘This miraculous doesn’t control its wearer,’ he said.”

“Then he explained that the lie was a gift to the person he gave the ring to; the _name_ was the important thing. Nobody would surrender so easily to some random woman named Marinette, for all she had a powerful Miraculous, nor, for that matter, to him. _His_ name was Ryan, and he’d inherited it, like I was about to, from a man named Cummerbund.”

“The _original_ ‘Nine-Lived One’ was named Roberts, and he had, of course, been retired for almost 15 years, and was living like a king in Patagonia.”

She shrugged. “So, we staged a ‘dark ritual,’ that made it look like I’d been unwillingly made into the new host, let him live for having been a good servant, and sent him away in a rowboat with ample provisions to reach a nearby island, where, of course, there was plenty of stockpiled treasure and a small ship of his own, with a new crew that didn’t know his history. From that day on, _I _was the new Nine.”

She looked over at him. “Except, of course, that for all my piracy, I couldn’t stop my heart being stolen.” She winked. “So now, you’ll be known as the man who ended the Nine-Lived One’s reign of terror over the seas, and kept the world safe from her forever…” A long second passed, and as he looked back up at her, she slowly turned red.

_“I… I- I- I mean… If you… Want to be.”_

Adrien didn’t say anything, his eyes slowly widening as he realized he’d basically just received a proposal.

Then, words failing him, he reached out again, and wrapped her in a hug.

She swallowed, heavily, and gently returned the gesture, wrapping her arms around his head.

_“Yes.”_ He managed.

For a minute, maybe more, they didn’t move. The only sound was the popping and flaring of the flame geyser a few feet away.

Then, Marinette straightened up, wincing as she did so; love did many things, as did her Miraculous, but neither of them entirely covered the combination of damages she’d taken today, nor the fatigue of the whole thing, and Adrien couldn’t be much better.

Still, the sooner they made it out of here, the lower the odds of something coming after them; there were _rumors_ about this swamp.

“Let’s get moving.”

Adrien stood up, with an effort, and followed her.

The path back out was much more… Strenuous, than the path in, but after Adrien almost drowned in lightning sand, and Marinette took a nasty bite from an unusually sized rodent before she could obliterate it, they finally managed to make it back to the edge of the swamp, to the sight of…

_“I knew you would return from—” _Gabriel froze, staring at Marinette. “_You.”_

Marinette looked up at him. “Me? I’m sorry, I don’t think we’ve been introduced.”

Gabriel didn’t introduce himself, his expression going dark.

_“Surrender.”_

“You mean you want to surrender to me? Well, I didn’t expect there to be a need for _any_ surrender, but, I certainly won’t decline.”

The bleeding at her shoulder was a bit more than she would have liked, and her legs were finally beginning to give out, but _he_ didn’t need to know that.

“I give you full credit for _nerve._ I recommend you stop before you mark yourself a fool.”

“Father, please, before you—”

_“Silence, Adrien._”

Marinette’s fingers twitched at the way he said it.

“I think you don’t understand the situation here,” said Marinette.

“I think I understand perfectly well,” said Gabriel, coldly. “Adrien is running from his responsibilities, and has mistakenly enlisted the help of a woman would has spent the last two years sabotaging my every move.”

Adrien turned. _“What?”_

Marinette glanced back at him, and he saw… Uncertainty.

“I’m afraid I don’t understand you.”

He waved a hand, and glittering butterflies flapped forth.

Marinette’s eyes narrowed, and at the apparent threat, she easily pulled her baton out. “Actually, I might have some idea.”

“I tell you again. _Surrender._”

_“_It will not happen_!”_

Adrien, uncertain looked back and forth between the two, before…

His eyes caught on figures in the trees nearby, gleaming with the faint light of his father’s power.

There were crossbows, trained carefully on Marinette.

“One last time,” said Gabriel, and it was clear that by now they _all_ knew about the crossbows. _“Surrender!”_

“_Your servants show no mercy, and neither would you!”_

_“Will you promise not to hurt her!?”_

At the outburst, the entire scene seemed to freeze.

All eyes turned to Adrien.

_“What?’_ said Marinette and Gabriel in unison.

_“If we surrender, and I return with you, will you promise not to hurt her?”_

Gabriel stared down his son, his mind visibly buzzing with thought.

Eventually, he nodded. “Nathalie will see it done.”

Nathalie nodded, almost smiling.

“She’s… A sailor, on the pirate ship Revenge. Promise to return her to it.”

This time, he didn’t have to think about it.

_“Of course.”_

Marinette, bending as if she’d taken a kick to the stomach, locked eyes with Adrien.

_“I thought you were dead once,” _he whispered, _“I couldn’t bear it if you died again, when I had a chance to save you.”_

Marinette seemed at a loss for words.

So was Adrien, as he was rapidly pulled away, and placed on his father’s horse.

And then, they were riding away, leaving behind…

Marinette looked around at the soldiers that surrounded her.

The crossbows had come back up almost the _instant_ that Adrien had been pulled away.

There was a long silence.

“I think I’ve found orders with your name on them,” said Marinette, with more confidence than she felt. “Usually bloody ones.”

“And Gabriel’s told me of a woman in black with a penchant for abruptly severing his link with his servants.”

There was another silence, this one longer, more uncomfortable uncomfortable.

“Where is your ship.”

Marinette looked up at her.

“I don’t think either of us were born to lie.”

There was the sound of footsteps behind her.

Nathalie shrugged.

“Agreed.”

Marinette’s head cocked, and at that, Nathalie held up a finger. There was the sense of a blow not yet delivered.

_“What?”_

“You know, that brooch, the one in the shape of a fan… It wouldn’t happen to be a Miraculous, would it?”

Nathalie managed to suggest through complete inaction that it was.

“Someone is looking for you.”

The finger fell.

The blow fell.

Marinette fell.


	11. The Pit of Torment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Marinette prepares for suffering.  
Adrien prepares for marriage.

Marinette, frankly, hadn’t expected to ever open her eyes again, yet open they did.

Of course, she could have complained about her surroundings…

The first thing she noticed was the room; this place was cold, and dark, and the only light seemed to come from a few torches on the wall. There was a small desk nearby, with a few loose papers sitting on in, and a few chairs near to it. The only sign of an entry or exit was a set of stairs on the far side of the room.

The second thing she noticed was as she tried to sit up; her right arm, the one with the ring on it, was restrained. Specifically, it was locked in such a way that she couldn’t bend her elbow, and her hand wasn’t touching _anything_ else. The rest of her limbs were restrained a bit less… _strenuously, _but still leaving no room for escape.

Idly, Marinette wondered if that meant they knew about the destruction…

A smile crept across her face, despite her surroundings; they would have found out pretty definitively what her ring could do, because they’d have tried to it off.

The smile vanished in an instant as there was a creaking, and a door at the top of the stairs swung open.

Passing through…

For a second, she was certain her eyes were messing with her, but…

He was _massive._ A giant of a man, stepped, unnaturally quietly down the stairs, holding a metal tray of… Food? Poison?

He came closer. At this distance, she could guess that he was probably fairly old, and… he didn’t seem to have any particular feelings about his circumstances.

As he finally made it to her, he set down the tray.

“Where am I?” asked Marinette.

He looked at her, looked away, and didn’t say a word.

He picked something up off the tray, and stepped to her side.

She jerked away as he reached for her, and he flinched back, and held up…

A damp rag, a roll of cloth.

With the two things between his thumb and forefingers, he held up his hands, as if to suggest he wasn’t holding anything else.

After a second, he glanced over at her heavily restrained arm, pointed at it, and definitively pointed at the ground.

She relaxed it. “It’s not like I could _actually_ do anything.”

He shrugged, and reached forward.

As the rag made contact, Marinette winced.

Right. Among her numerous other minor injuries, that unusually sized rodent had taken a bite out of her.

She did her best not to flinch too much, and… Well, despite his massive size, this giant’s motions were no rougher than anyone else’s. Really, it wasn’t _too_ painful. She’d felt worse, anyway.

“So… does this mean you’re _not_ going to kill me?”

He paused… Then shrugged, nodding.

“I can’t imagine that anyone was _actually_ planning to return me to my ship, though.”

He shook his head.

“So… Imprisonment, seems like a waste of _everybody’s_ time.”

He nodded.

“Then… If it’s not death, and it’s not freedom… I’d say torture, but then why bother healing me?”

He shrugged.

“_Is_ it torture?”

He paused, for a long time, looked down…

Eventually, he just… shrugged.

“So… Not pleasant, is what you’re saying, or… Not saying, but…”

He nodded, and, pulling away, tapped at his throat.

“I assumed.”

There was a long silence.

“Well,” said Marinette eventually, “We’ll see how I handle torture.”

He shrugged, tapped his finger, gestured at her hand, tapped at the center of his chest, gestured at… He couldn’t seem to find what he was referencing for that one… He managed to imply that whatever he’d just listed would complicate matters significantly, and he didn’t know how it would add up.

Marinette almost got the impression that he was hoping she did well.

****Adrien felt as if some key nerve had been severed. He wandered through the halls, which had slowly become more and more crowded as the wedding had drawn closer, and almost didn’t notice the guests.

He’d met Chloe again, for what must have been the first time in _years_ by now. She was just as abrasive as ever; if he’d had to guess, that was part of the reason his father had even managed to _arrange_ what, by all rights, should have been an impossible match.

And yet, he couldn’t muster any joy at his impending wealth.

Wealth couldn’t buy the comfort he needed right now.

Gabriel and Nathalie looked after him as he walked away.

“He’s been acting like this since the Fire Swamp,” he said.

He looked over at Nathalie.

“He is, of course, worried about the effects of an insufficiently negotiated marriage on his people.”

She nodded, solemnly. “Of course.”

Gabriel renegotiated all day long, and by dusk, the deal was struck to the satisfaction of all parties. There was no more point in waiting, so before the following dawn, Adrien and Chloe were married.

And, at noon, he met his subjects. If, before, he’d been of higher birth than any of them, he was now, by marriage, even greater than his own father.

"It is only by mutual compromise that we find peace," said Gabriel, "so by this marriage-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, hold it.  
I've got to be mistelling this, or... something.  
After everything he went through with Marinette, there's no way this is how the story's supposed to go.
> 
> I'll get back to you after I look a bit ahead, okay?


	12. "Boo!"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adrien's meeting with his people is rapidly interrupted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, but you know what? No more interruptions. We’re just going to keep moving.

“It is only by mutual compromise that we find peace,” said Gabriel, “so by this marriage, it to be hoped that the anger of the past may be left behind. I present to you, the future of our countries.”

And Adrien, barely knowing how he was still on his feet, stepped out of the castle, into the courtyard, next to Chloe.

The crowd was gigantic, which was bad enough, but worse, was as all of them slowly knelt.

All except-

_“Boo!”_

Everyone’s heads turned at the sound, towards a standing figure at the back of the crowd.

_“Boo!” _repeated the figure, sliding forward.

The condemnation continued as the figure came closer, and Adrien began to make out…

Pitch black skin, smoking lightly, and… Either his clothes were the same material, or he wasn’t wearing them.

_“What, is, that,”_ said Chloe beside him, managing to sound both scared and offended.

The figure waved a hand.

_“Shut up._”

Chloe was gone, in a puff of smoke.

_“Actually!_” said the figure, “I think the rest of you have already done what I needed you to.” And then he, for it seemed like a him, spun, arm outstretched, and suddenly, it was only the two of them in the courtyard.

_“Wh- What? Why? Why are you doing this?”_

Despite the figure’s skin being so black it was almost a hole in the world, as it held up its hands near its face, Adrien got the impression it was exasperated.

It seemed to hesitate, and then, in a rush-

_“Because you got my hopes up.”_

Adrien… Blinked.

“What?”

“Listen, you know how rare true love is? I’ll give you a hint; it’s _really_ rare. You show up talking about how much it’s hurt you to lose her, and then it turns out she’s alive, and you do _what!?_ You just… _let her go again?_”

“I… They would have _killed_ her if I hadn’t.”

This didn’t seem to satisfy him.

“She is _still alive,_ and you’re marrying someone else? That’s…” He paused, and then, after a long moment, just shrugged. “That’s just depressing.”

A long second passed, and as Adrien failed to give a proper response, the figure seemed to finally give up. 

“Well… Fine then. If _that’s_ how you want to live, then go ahead. Go be a prince, or a king, and throw _actual_ love away like a piece of _garbage._”

The landscape around them began to disintegrate.

“Oh. One more thing. If you ever come to visit again, _I wasn’t here.”_

_Visit? What was he-_

Adrien sat bolt upright in bed.

For a second, he couldn’t quite parse what had happened, but then he remembered.

It was still ten days until the wedding and negotiations still hadn’t been completed, but his nightmares had been getting worse.

He started running, heedless of the fact that people would already be awake at this hour.

_“I love Marinette.”_

His father looked up from his desk, and Nathalie looked over from a wall, both visibly alarmed.

“That’s what it comes down to. I always have, and… I’m realizing that I always will. If you tell me I have to marry someone else, please, believe me when I say that I’ll never willingly be in this castle again.”

His father and Nathalie shared a look.

A long moment passed, and his father’s nails drummed, slowly, rhythmically, against the table.

Finally, he spoke.

_“Adrien…_ I trust you know what a difficult position you’re putting me in.”

A second more, and Adrien was unflinching.

“Well then. It seems that there would be little use in forcing a marriage where one party is set on avoiding it.”

He turned to Nathalie. “You returned her to her ship?”

Nathalie nodded, solemnly.

“Then by all means, we will alert her.” His expression sharpened slightly. “Are you sure she still wants you? You were the one who left _her, _and pirates are not known for keeping their words.”

“She will always come for me.”

“Then I offer you a deal; Write four copies of a letter. I will send out my four fastest ships. The Revenge is always close by at this time of year. They will run up the white flag, and deliver your message. If she accepts, then I would rather have a poor marriage than lose more of my family. And if she doesn’t… I suggest you consider the value of a diplomatically profitable marriage, compared to throwing away everything you have ever known.”

Adrien didn’t speak.

_“Are we agreed?”_

Adrien’s hand clenched at his side.

He nodded.

“Good.”

Gabriel and Nathalie walked easily through a small copse of trees, all thick and knotted.

“Adrien seems unnaturally idealistic. He cares much more for how he feels the world _should_ be than how it _is._”

Gabriel sighed. “He takes after his mother. Doubtless, she will be proud of him the next time they meet.”

“…Of course, sir.”

For a second, Gabriel seemed to struggle with a thought, and then smiled.

“You know, for days after he was recovered, I was _angry._ I had assumed that I had lost my chance to frame the Gilded Kingdom, but… I believe now that _she_ had done me a favor in thwarting my initial plans. A simple kidnapping would likely have been enough, but… A failed assassination attempt will _outrage_ the populace. War will be inevitable.”

Nathalie let out what could have been the barest edge of a laugh. “Agreed, sir.”

Now truly in amongst the trees, Nathalie singled one out, and stepped up to it.

She seemed to search for something, and then… She pressed one knot, seemingly indistinguishable from the rest.

A part of the tree swung inwards.

“Will you be coming along, sir? She’s finally healthy enough for me to get to work on her.”

“Nathalie, you’re well aware of how much I enjoy watching your attempts, but I have a wedding to prepare, contracts to solidify, an assassination to fake, and the Gilded Kingdom to frame for it. I’m far too busy.”

“Of course,” said Nathalie. “As your assistant, I have one piece of advice; keep yourself balanced. Sowing chaos will hurt you as well, if you let it.”

“You would know.”

Nathalie smiled, and in a flicker, her plain, sensible clothes were replaced with a flowing purple dress, and her skin was a soft blue.

“I would.”


	13. 10 to 0

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Marinette faces down Gabriel's assistant, Gabriel faces down paperwork, and the wedding day arrives all too soon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The interesting thing I've realized is that while a lot happens, it happens in remarkably short scenes.
> 
> Were I the more ambitious sort, I'd probably recut this so that instead of going scene for scene with the movie, it would be better suited for a written style.

Nathalie’s expression faded back to its eternal neutrality.

She seemed to _flow_ down the steps into the Pit of Torment, her right hand tapping lightly at the fan which was holstered at her side.

And there was Marinette, with the same black suit, and the same restraints.

Nathalie was pleased to note that the restraints on her arm had worked, especially considering the fact that her left hand was still healing from her attempt to _remove_ the ring.

Best that she didn’t have the chance to use it.

“Have you been enjoying your stay?”

Marinette managed a smile of false confidence. “Of course. It’s great down here.”

“Hm,” she said, as some trace of amusement prickled at her.

“I’m sure you have some conception of what I’m capable of by now.”

“You transform people.”

“I summon their emotions into a solid form,” she corrected. “Though, of course, that does manifest as a transformation. I’ve been perfecting my craft for almost 5 years, now, and I believe I’m getting close to my goal.”

“Which is?”

She gave Marinette an impassive look.

“I’ll make you a deal; wait a few seconds, and I will answer you.”

Marinette blinked at her.

She withdrew the fan with a practiced motion, and, with an even _more_ practiced motion, snapped it open_._

Her hand tensed as the pain hit her, and there was a strange, unnatural noise, like lightning, as the fan’s feathers twisted, broke, regrew before her.

She powered through the pain, and focused on her target.

Marinette, not entirely certain what Nathalie was doing, felt like she was _sick, _as if her whole body was going to throw up.

Her breathing shook, her stomach unsteady, as long, long seconds passed.

And then, suddenly, the sensation vanished.

She tried to focus her vision, her eyes failing to obey her, and then…

She blinked in the sudden light, and looked at Nathalie again.

There was no new light.

Nathalie looked emotionlessly at her.

“Interesting,” she said.

_“What?_”

“Control,” she said.

“Wh- What?”

“My goal. You asked.”

A smile curled unsettlingly across Nathalie’s face, as she looked directly into Marinette’s eyes.

“This Miraculous is _meant_ to create guardians out of emotions, but it’s broken. It’s _meant_ to create them _outside_ of the person the emotion is from. Instead… It overwrites them. I could, of course, simply annihilate your soul now, but I see no reason to do that. It’s far more useful to both of us if I do this properly, so, for both of our benefits, what did you feel as I began?”

“I- I… I…” The words weren’t flowing properly.

Nathalie watched her flounder.

“Interesting.”

Gabriel had been telling the truth when he’d said that he was swamped; The Gilded Kingdom had subtly different marriage laws, and he was on a time-crunch, which they were _trying_ to use to force him into a bad deal. That, coupled with the fact that he’d had to step out to send messages to his fake assassin, and again to handle a rowdy decorator…

When his chief enforcer walked in, it almost didn’t matter that Gabriel himself had summoned him.

“Sir? You called for me,” he said, his voice a light drawl.

Mentally, Gabriel regeared himself for the conversation.

“I did.” He stood up, and looked over. “Close the door.”

The man gave him a questioning look, but complied.

As the comparative silence struck them, Gabriel looked him dead in the eye.

“As my chief enforcer, you are the only one with whom I will entrust this secret; I have reason to believe there may be assassins in the Thieves’ Forest plotting to kill Adrien on his wedding night.”

He let the words sink in, and then…

“There are even whispers that it is a plot by the Gilded Kingdom.”

The man stared.

“Sir, my spy network has heard no such thing.”

Gabriel was about to make some statement about how he had _other_ sources, but was spared the trouble by Adrien’s entry.

Barely even noticing the enforcer, Adrien looked directly at Gabriel.

“Have you heard anything from Marinette?”

“You would have heard about it if I had,” he said, his expression carefully neutral.

“She _will_ come for me.”

He didn’t say a word, as Adrien left again.

That was the _second_ time he’d done that, and Gabriel was starting to get tired of it.

He turned back to his enforcer.

“I will not see him hurt. On the day of the wedding, the Thieves’ Forest must be emptied, and the inhabitants arrested.”

“Many of the inhabitants will resist. My regular enforcers will be inadequate.”

Gabriel shrugged. “Then form a brute squad. I will willingly supply additional power if you need it, but the Thieves’ Forest _must_ be emptied before the wedding.”

“It will still be difficult, sir.”

Gabriel looked around at the paperwork.

“Believe me. I understand _difficult._”

...

The day of the wedding had arrived. The brute squad had their hands full carrying out Gabriel’s orders, but with a bit of elbow grease, the chief enforcer had already gotten a wagon full of the Forest’s occupants, which, at a glance, had just about everyone…

“_Is_ that everyone?” asked the enforcer to an assistant who was shimmering with the power of one of Gabriel’s butterflies.

“Almost. There’s a woman with a Miraculous who’s giving us some trouble.”

“Well then. Give her some trouble right back, why don’t you?”

The brute blinked blankly at him, as the wagon receded into the distance.

He turned towards the hovel of a meeting house that doubled as an inn in this tiny settlement.

_“Give her some trouble right back,”_ he mimicked, and scoffed. “_What did you think we were doing?”_

Because, the problem with _this_ particular woman was…

He opened the door into the inn.

It was full.

Well, not _actually_ full, but there were orange figures everywhere, and a pair of bewildered enforcers.

The enforcers were _trying_ to clear her out, but none of the figures seemed to be, and every time they swung their clubs through one, it disintegrated, only to be replaced moments later by another_._

As he entered, her voice rose up from some indeterminable place in the room.

_“Is that you, Lila? You should have been back days ago.”_

There was a flicker in the figures, and they moved erratically for an instant, and then all turned to look at him.

_“Ho there,”_ he said.

There was a dismissive noise from a figure by the bar, “keep your ‘_ho there’,_ I already told the others, I’m not moving_._”

“Gabriel has given his orders.”

“Well I don’t answer to him,” came the voice, much nearer, and to his surprise, one of the figures stood up, and walked vaguely towards him, swaying unnervingly, a flute in her hand. “When a job goes wrong, you go back to the beginning. This is where we got the job, so it’s the beginning, and I’m staying here until Lila gets here.”

Surely this couldn’t be the real one. Then again, surely he couldn’t pass up the chance if it was.

He pulled back his club, and let fly-

It bounced off of nothing in front of her.

She blinked at her continued survival, and the shimmer of green in front of her.

“Oh,” she said, flatly.

_“What,”_ he said, and then felt a presence behind him.

“Alright dude,” came a man’s voice, “c’mon, get out of here.”

He spun, club flailing wildly at what seemed to be _another_ person who wasn’t supposed to be here.

He yelped, dropping his weapon at the shock of hitting something solid and unyielding.

He was face to face with a man who _also_ seemed to be using a Miraculous, whose shield had effortlessly blocked his club.

“I don’t think we’ll be sticking around here anyway,” he said, turning to the other enforcers. “I figure I collect my friend, we head out, and nobody gets hurt.”

“You have to be arrested,” said one of the enforcers in the back.

“Alright, I hear one vote for fighting,” said the man, pointing at the one who'd spoken, “any more?”

He had a job to do, and if he didn’t do it, Gabriel would _know,_ if he was paying even a lick of attention.

He surreptitiously picked up the club, as the other enforcer dithered.

“C’mon, dude,” he said to the woman, as she staggered a bit closer.

One more time, he pulled back the club, and _swung-_

The club ricocheted off another of those transparent green barriers, and back into his face.

The one who had opted for combat tried to take advantage of what should have been a distraction, rapidly received a shield to the throat, and collapsed, struggling for breath.

The remaining enforcer thought better of it, and slipped out the back.

“Alright, that’s everyone,” said the man, as his friend finally made it to him, “let’s get going.”

He tried to claw his way to his feet again, but he seemed almost concussed, and couldn’t quite make his limbs do what he was trying to tell them to.

Nino, holding on to Alya’s arm, led her easily out of the building.

“You don’t look so good,” he said, at her visibly lack of steadiness on her feet.

“Just a bit tired,” she said, “I’m _fine…_”

“Yeah, you don’t _sound_ so good either.”

“No… No, I’m fine.”

“Yeah?”

He let go of her.

She took a step forward…

And then fell on her face

“Yeah… That’s about what I expected.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're coming up on some of my favorite scenes. Specifically, one particular scene that should make a lot of things make much more sense.


	14. 'She'd be ashamed of you'

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nino and Alya catch up.  
Adrien has a tense conversation with his father.  
Marinette...  
It's going to be quite a day for her.

After she’d almost passed out on the ground, he’d been forced to carry her under one arm, and managed to get her into one of the houses that had already been searched.

From there, he’d been able to use their cooking fire to make some soup, and had set Alya out on a low bedroll, where she’d been still until the smell of food had presumably awoken her.

“Hey, dude,” he said.

Swaying unsteadily, in a way that could potentially have ended with her going into the fire, Alya sat up.

“Where are we?”

“Haven’t gone far, just a few houses over.”

Alya sighed. “Any word from Lila?”

He hesitated.

“Actually…” He passed her the bowl, and a spoon, “Here’s the thing about that; I was actually working with the brute squad, and one of them was actually _with_ what’s-his-name when he was going after Adrien.”

“Gabriel. His name is Gabriel.”

“Right! Well, anyway, dude was talking about how the trip, seemed really proud of it, actually… Ah, anyway, he mentioned that they found Adrien with some pirate woman, and she’d apparently… Well she’d done what she did, y’know? Beat you, beat me, and, I’m not kidding, _turned Lila to dust._”

Alya almost choked on her soup.

_“Wait.”_ She twisted her nose, with the motion of someone who had gotten something in it, and looked back at him.

She looked at him, and moved her lips silently.

Nino got the impression she wasn’t sure what to ask about first.

_“She beat you?”_

He shrugged. “Yeah.”

“I guess I shouldn’t be surprised she beat Lila, but… wow.”

“Yeah, there was something about Lila using Adrien as a hostage, and she got poisoned, or something, but… Yeah, I don’t know. Oh.”

“Oh…” Alya frowned. “So… She drank poison, but… She must have been tricked into it.”

“Apparently she was _really_ proud of herself when she died.”

Alya whistled. “So, she outfought _both_ of us, _and_ beat Lila without her even realizing she’d lost before she’s too late.”

“Yup.”

“Well,” said Alya, taking another spoon of soup, “that’s impressive. How’d they catch her?”

“Got her surrounded, and, _apparently,_ the only reason they didn’t have to fight her was because Adrien was willing to come back with them if they let her go.”

Alya’s brow furrowed. “He got kidnapped. Was he already planning on leaving when we found him?”

“Dunno, dude, but apparently they’re in love.”

“Huh.” Alya took another spoon of stew, "I guess that explains why she was so determined to catch up with him."

“Oh, but here’s the kicker; apparently, they didn’t even let her go! This dude was talking about how they took her to this ‘Pit of Torment.’”

“Well that’s a fun name,” said Alya, through a mouth of stew.

“Yeah… Don’t think they guy really knew what it was, but it had something to do with…” Nino stopped.

“What?”

“Alright, listen, dude, you’re sleep deprived. I need you to sleep before I tell you anything else.”

She swung to face him, downing the last of the bowl.

“Uh huh. Right.”

Nino frowned. “C’mon dude, trust me on this.”

“I’ll make you a deal. I’ll sleep _after_ you tell me. I can’t sleep when I’m curious about something.”

Nino stared her down.

The problem was, he _remembered_ the dozens of times she’d woken him up in the middle of the night to ask him about something pointless.

She could easily follow the same pattern _this_ time, which would mean…

“You’re lying down _first,_” he said.

Smiling, she rolled her eyes, and complied.

“Okay?”

There was a long second, and he shifted a bit closer, his hand coming up slightly, ready to move.

“Nino, this is unnecessary, I’m not about to—”

“The guy I was talking to started thinking about all of this after a blue woman showed up to talk to the captain.”

He was almost too slow, as his hand _slammed_ down into Alya’s stomach. She gasped, but kept struggling to stand, scratching at him.

_“No,” _he said, voice a bit less relaxed than usual. “You’re _going_ to sleep.”

_“How many blue women are there in the world? It _has_ to be her.”_

“I know,” he said, ignoring her claws scrabbling at his wrist, “and she’s _in a castle,_ _which is guarded by 30 men._ That’s not something you can do when you’ve been awake for… How long _have_ you been awake?”

“Only a day or so, and if you think I’m going to let _that_ stop me—”

_“I’m not saying you’ll let it, dude, I’m saying it _will_.”_

Alya was out of breath already, but she was still weakly trying to scratch at him.

“I don’t want to wait.”

Nino sighed.

“Neither do I; they say she’s out on missions a lot, but she’s here now, and you _can’t afford to pass out in the middle of this.”_

_“I’m not going to… I’m not going to pass out,”_ said Alya, _“I’m going to… I’m…”_

She was fighting to stay awake, but it wasn’t working.

“Easy, dude… You’ve still got plenty of time… Just gotta take a little nap… It’s gonna be fine…”

She stared up at him, seeming almost betrayed, but… Finally, her eyes closed.

Nino waited a second, and pulled his hand away.

He leaned up against a wall.

Judging by the angle of the sun… It was a few hours before noon, and the wedding that was presumably keeping the blue woman began only a few hours before sundown which meant…

They still had time, 7, maybe 8 hours at least.

\--

Technically speaking there were still 2, maybe 3 hours for things to go wrong before the wedding started.

Still, the negotiations were theoretically finished, and Chloe hadn’t complained about anything for the last ten minute, which was a good start.

His show of worrying about assassins, meanwhile…

“The Forest is empty, sir, and 30 men guard the gates.”

He looked up.

“Double it. The occasion demands it.”

The man opened his mouth to respond, hesitated, and then…

“As you’re no doubt aware, there is only one gate key currently in circulation, and I have that.”

“Then for your own protection,” said Gabriel, shrugging, and then, at the sound of the door, he looked up.

“Adrien.”

“You asked for me, Father?”

“Tonight is the wedding,” he said, unnecessarily, “and tomorrow, the same men who guard the gates tonight will escort you and Chloe to the channel, where you will be accompanied by every ship in my armada to your honeymoon.”

“Except the four fastest.”

For a second, the words didn’t register with him.

“Every ship but the four you sent.”

“Of course. Not those four.”

The Chief Enforcer, sensing something in the air, took his leave. Too much to do, too many places to be that weren’t here.

Adrien watched him go, watched the door close.

“You never sent the ships, did you. Don’t… Don’t answer that, you’d just lie again.” He sighed, his eyes pained. Then, he sighed, and seemed to resolve himself. “It doesn’t matter, though. Marinette _will_ come for me.”

“I don’t think you understand what you’re talking about.”

“No. I _do_ understand, Father. I understand that you’re scared. You’re scared that your grab for money and power won’t work.”

_“I would recommend you don’t presume to know my aims.”_

“Why not? What else would you be trying to do? I know you’ve been grabbing Miraculouses. I know you’ve spent too much money, you’ve _hurt_ people. I know that you’re looking for something to hold on to, since Mom died, but in the process… She’d be ashamed of you, Father.”

For an _instant,_ there was a flash of something behind Gabriel’s eyes, and then his expression went completely blank.

Seconds went by, time stretching out.

Eventually, he spoke.

“The only reason you are alive right now,” he said, voice trembling, “is because you are my son.”

Adrien met his eyes, and found no emotion. There was only the total restraint of a man who knows that the slightest lapse would result in catastrophic damage.

“Go to your room. _Now._”

Adrien, brave, but not foolish, complied.

\--

How long she’d been down there, Marinette didn’t know; Nathalie had come and gone 10, maybe 15 times, but the intervals seemed irregular, and more to the point, Marinette was losing count.

That worried her; she’d been trying to pay attention, but everything had gotten… _fuzzier._

Nathalie was writing something down.

That meant she’d just used her Miraculous again, surely, which made it all the more distressing to Marinette that she didn’t remember it. It was unpleasant when she used it, right? That should have stuck with her, then, but there was no memory, and-

She was jolted from her disjointed musings by light in the distance, and a figure moving, as the door to the outside world opened.

A man she was sure she should recognize entered, moving purposefully.

He strode up, and bent down in front of her.

_“I remember you. Did you know that? I remember Adrien moping for years when you were supposed to have died.”_

She stared, almost uncomprehending.

_“You should have stayed dead. And _this_ time… For the suffering you’ve put me through, I’ll return some taste of it.”_

He straightened up, and turned to Nathalie.

“_Nathalie.”_

“Sir?”

_“Break her.”_

Nathalie seemed almost alarmed.

“Sir? She’s the most successful subject I’ve ever had, I believe that with only-

“I said… _Break. Her.”_

There was a long, long second as the two of them looked at each other.

Nathalie looked down, and sighed.

“Yes sir.”

Marinette looked up at her as she brought up the fan.

“You should know,” she said, “I truly wish I didn’t have to do this.”

And then—


	15. The Scream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A scream rises from the forest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not to be confused with the famous painting by Edvard Munch. This is just the sound of the ultimate suffering.

The sound seemed to come from far, far away, but there was something about it that felt like it was coming from inside the listener’s chest.

And… There was no human alive that could have made such a sound, and it’d be a stretch to assign it to any animal.

\--

In the castle’s courtyard, the chief enforcer looked up as the sound reached him, and his hands clenched involuntarily around his club.

His eyes shut in his best attempt to keep himself insulated, and…

After a few long, long seconds, the sound dissipated, and, as he opened his eyes, he could pretend that nothing had happened.

Most of the 60 guards around him had matched his demeanor, and the few who had started shaking had sheepishly calmed down as they realized that they were in the minority.

\--

Adrien heard the sound, too, and something about it tore at him, leaving him staggered and out of breath.

Maybe it was the fact that something in it echoed his feelings about the upcoming wedding.

And in the village…

\--

If the eyes were the window to the soul, then Alya’s had had a brick thrown through them.

By the time Nino even _registered_ the sound, she had already slammed into the door, and by the time he’d made it to his feet, she’d found her way out.

_“Alya!”_ he called, scrambling after her as she ran.

She didn’t listen, and he tried to catch up with her, almost stationary in comparison.

A second passed, then two, and she turned a corner, out of sight, heading, if he had things right, towards the source of the scream.

The sound finally died away, and, after a few more seconds of hard running, he skidded around the same corner she had, and…

She was standing in the middle of the street.

Slightly winded from going directly from sitting to sprinting, Nino slowed to a walk.

She didn’t seem to notice him approach. For that matter, she didn’t even seem to _move._

He waited.

Nothing happened.

“Dude?”

No response.

“Alya?”

She stiffened slightly, at her name.

“You alright?”

Moments passed.

He was about to repeat himself, when—

Almost imperceptibly, she shook her head.

_“I know that sound,”_ she said, voice barely a whisper. Then, as if she wasn’t even thinking about it, she started forward again. _“That was the sound my father made. She burned out his mind and left only his desire to protect me, and that was the sound he made, and she did it again, just now, and that means that if I can get to where the scream came from then I’ll find her, and I can take her Miraculous, and I can save my father, and—”_

_Nino, starting to lose track of the thread, followed after her._

Out of the tiny, disreputable village, up the river, past the outskirts of town, over the bridge, through the woods, and the whole time, Alya didn’t stop muttering to herself until…

_“It should be here,”_ she said, stopping suddenly.

“What?”

_“She_ should be here,” she amended. “The scream came from this direction, but she’s not _here._”

“Well…” said Nino, “Maybe she’s out in the woods?”

“I… Maybe,” said Alya, her clawed fingers twitching at her sides, “but _where._ She has to be…”

She stopped.

“Dude?”

He followed her gaze, to…

He tilted his head slightly.

“Huh.”

A man, an exceptionally _large_ man, was pushing a wheelbarrow out of the woods, he made it to the road they were on, and starting inexorably wheeling his way towards them.

They looked at each other.

Then, Alya stepped swiftly forward, and Nino was forced to rush to keep up.

\--

Really, what had he been expecting? She’d been holding on well, of course, but… He’d seen the result Nathalie’s powers had on people; it had to be, what, 13-14 times by now? None of _them_ had made it out even _functional_, and she’d just gone for raw destruction this time.

The girl, _Marinette,_ hadn’t stood a chance.

And now…

He let out a breath, slightly more aggravated than usual.

Now he had to dispose of her, which was the part of this whole thing that he disliked _most._

He was just beginning to wonder if anyone would realize what had happened if he just threw her out into the woods, instead of—There was a hand on his throat.

Ordinarily, that wouldn’t have been a concern for him, but there was altogether too much _point_ on this hand. As his eyes focused, he saw…

\--

“Where’s the blue woman?”

The man blinked at her.

“Come on, we don’t have all day. You work in the Pit of Despair, don’t you?”

Something shifted in his expression, and he slowly, _too_ slowly, shook his head.

He was lying, of course, and Alya was just considering how to get him to talk, when—

Something caught her attention from below, the wadded mass of cloth in the wheelbarrow had shifted.

“Nino,” she said. 

He nodded, and reached down, pulling aside the aside the blanket, revealing…

Alya barely managed to stop her fist from clenching as a curious, and altogether inhuman face looked back at her. It was like… It was uncomfortably close to what her father had looked like, but… More… _Catlike._

The man grimaced.

“I’ll ask you again; _where is she?”_

With the reluctance of a man who knows he doesn’t have a leg to deny on, he reached up his hand, and… pointed back behind them.

Alya couldn’t quite keep her hand steady, and the claws pushed in tight enough that she knew one slip would draw blood.

“No. The scream came from here, which means _she’s_ here.”

He shrugged.

He pointed back from the direction he’d come, and traced the line across the ground that curved from back in the trees, past where they were, and, with a flick of his finger, went off in the direction he’d pointed initially.

“You expect me to believe that she just… _packed up and left_ the instant she…” she gestured down at the figure in the barrow, “_did this?”_

He just shrugged, the message clear; _‘Well? What else am I supposed to say?’_

Alya, hand still at his throat, turned to look behind her, gazing off into the distance.

Her expression was inscrutable.

Nino met the man’s eyes, and just shrugged.

“Alya?”

She blinked, jolted from whatever line of thinking she’d been following.

“She’s back in the castle, then,” she said, “and she’s probably going to be there during the wedding, and then… who knows.”

She sighed.

“Which means we’re back to square one. Our only way to get to her is to storm the castle…”

“Yeah…” said Nino.

“If we had Lila, she could probably talk her way in, but… She’s dead.” She looked up, as if asking _someone_ for another angle.

She seemed to find it, eyes lighting up.

“Okay. Okay! The woman in black! You said she was in love with Adrien, right? So… So she’d want to break up the wedding, and if she outthought Lila, then surely she’d be even _better_ for getting us inside, right?”

“I mean…” said Nino, his expression much less excited than Alya’s, “You remember the thing I told you just after I said that they were in love?”

Alya didn’t seem to, staring blankly at him.

He nodded his head towards the figure in the barrow. “I said they threw her in the Pit of Torment, and…”

Almost ruefully, the man, whose neck had to be hurting by now, nodded.

“Maybe… Maybe she was planning her escape when she got hit? If she can still plan…”

Alya trailed off, as the woman in black, or… Well, the black cat, really, met her eyes.

“Hm?”

There was no sense in those eyes.

Alya finally let the man’s neck go, and backed away.

“I don’t take defeat easily, but… Fighting through 30 guards, breaking into a castle, and still having the energy to take back the Miraculous… It’d take a plan that _neither of us can make,_ or a _miracle_, and I don’t know where to get my hands on _either_.”

There was a long, long silence, in which the former woman in black shifted, trying to get a better view of her surroundings.

“I might,” said Nino, with the surprised tone of someone who almost can’t believe what they’re saying.

“What?”

“We passed through here when we were escorting that merchant, right?”

Alya blinked.

“A couple months ago? The one that Lila flirted with so hard she gave us an extra hundred or so?”

“I… I think so?”

Nino laughed, weakly. “Do you have any money?”

“I—No, I spent the last of it yesterday while I was waiting for Lila.”

He sucked in a breath, but stayed even. “Okay, well, I’ve got _some_. We’ll just have to see if it’s enough to buy a miracle.”


	16. The Miracle Workers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alya and Nino try to buy a miracle from some... strange dealers.

They’d taken the wheelbarrow; neither of them wanted to carry a body, and the man hadn’t exactly tried very hard to hold onto it.

It had been back to the river, and then… _north._

To Alya’s surprise, there was, in fact, a small footpath, which, while not built for a wheelbarrow, was still useable.

And then, as the sun was beginning to go down…

She caught sight of a light in the distance. There was a small hovel, and coming through… A window? A gap in the wall? There was the light of a fire.

They stopped, mere feet from the door.

They looked at each other, neither of them entirely certain how to proceed.

“It doesn’t look like somewhere a miracle worker would live,” said Alya, uncertainly.

“Well, according to the guy I met in the bar, there are _two_ of them here,” said Nino, shrugging.

Then, with a sudden motion, Alya stepped forward, and rapped on the door.

No response.

She knocked again.

“Go away!” came a voice from inside, nasal, grating, and… _old._

That seemed to be all the response that was coming, so Alya knocked again.

There was a groan, and a sound of footsteps.

_“What, what?”_ came the voice again, and a small panel in the door slid aside revealing the speaker’s face.

He was old, wrinkled, and deathly pale, but his eyes were sharp, and annoyed.

“Are you a miracle worker?”

His expression twisted in distaste.

“I’m retired, and more to the point, discredited as far as anyone around here’s concerned, but thanks for reminding me; I’ll just go and give myself a paper cut and pour some lemon juice on it so I won’t have to think about it.”

The window shut.

Alya knocked again, and the man let out a sound that was less a groan, and more a _shout_ of annoyance.

The window opened again, to reveal the same face, now incensed.

“How about you leave now, before I call the brute squad?”

“Oh,” said Nino, “I’m on the brute squad. So you _are_ that Plagg guy I heard about?”

The man’s focus shifted away from Alya, and he looked Nino up and down. The anger faded slightly, and he gave an almost _impressed_ shrug.

“At least you got the name right.”

_“Listen,”_ said Alya, pushing herself forward slightly, “we need a miracle. It’s _urgent.”_

“Well, I’m retired,” said the man, “and if you’d paid _any_ attention, you’d know that the last time I tried to do a miracle, she _still_ died, and Gabriel proceeded to destroy my reputation. You sure you want your friend dead?”

“There’s nothing left to kill,” said Alya.

Plagg raised his eyebrows, for the first time seeming to feel something other than aggravation. “Nothing left, huh? I’ll take a look. Bring her in.”

With an effort, Nino pulled her out of the wheelbarrow, and hauled her bodily through the door as it opened.

“On the table,” he said, stepping out of the way.

They put her on the table, and, for a second, she started moving away.

“Stay put,” said the man, snapping his fingers, and to their surprise, she did.

“Oh yeah, I see what you mean,” he said, “this was, what, _Nathalie,_ right? That’s her name?”

“I… I don’t know,” said Alya, “the woman who did this… She was blue?”

He paused, and then, suddenly, nodded. “Right, I remember that.” He started prodding at his new patient, “Originally, it just drained your life away over time. We got it so that…” Still poking, he seemed to consider. “So that it drained your _emotions_ away, and, there was some other stuff. It turns you blue, obviously, and, the bit that we _didn’t_ realize,” he pressed his eye up close to hers, seeming to look for something. “It does _this _to people now_.”_

He pulled away, frowning.

_“No kidding,”_ he muttered, _“that shouldn’t…”_

He pulled away, and his head slowly turned towards her hand.

He easily lifted her wrist, and took a wondering look at her ring.

_“Well,_” he said, _“aren’t _you_ the lucky one.”_

“We really are in a terrible rush, here,” said Alya.

Still looking at the ring, the man scoffed. “You rush a miracle worker, you get rotten miracles. You got money?”

Alya held up the little they’d managed to gather.

“_Whoof,”_ said Plagg, “I’ve never worked for so little, except for _once,_ and that was only because…” he grimaced, “put it this way, it was a noble cause.”

“Oh, this is noble,” said Alya, desperate to speed things up, and willing to try channeling a bit of Lila. She pointed down. “She’s a… single mother. Her children are starving, and—

Plagg put up his hand. “Yeah, you’re an awful liar.”

“I’ve been tracking down the woman who did this to her for years so that I can help my father who also ended up like this.”

“Your first story was better.” He sighed. “She probably owes you money, huh? Tell you what, I’ll ask her.”

Alya blinked, as the man cracked his neck. “She’s… She’s an animal at this point, how’s she supposed to answer.”

“Ohh ho,” said the man, flexing his fingers, “look who knows so much. You see, it just so happens that your friend here is only _mostly_ an animal, and there’s a _big_ difference between mostly animal, and all animal_._”

He started rubbing his hands together. “Now, _mostly_ animal is still slightly human. If she was _all_ animal, there’d really only be one thing to do.”

“What’s that?” said Nino.

“Well, either you get the Miraculous that did this to her, or you give up, go through her clothes for loose change, and turn her loose in the forest.”

“Alright,” he said, pulling his hands apart.

Their eyes widened simultaneously, at the crackling network of black lightning that had formed between his fingers.

_“Hello in there!”_ he said, eyes gleaming green, hands steaming black, _“What’s so important? Why do you need to come back!?”_

And then his hands came down on her chest, and she convulsed, seemingly in pain.

_“True love!”_ came the response, strangled, pained, almost unintelligible, as her back twisted.

Then, she flopped back down, and the old man looked like any other old man again.

Alya tried, with limited success to stifle the surprise she felt, and managed to rally.

“True love,” she said, “You heard her. You couldn’t ask for a more noble cause than that.”

His face was impassive.

“Well…” he said, and then turned to look behind him through the doorway to the back of the hovel. Satisfied, he turned.

_“Fine, yes, true love is the greatest thing in the world,”_ he whispered, _“Except…” _he shrugged his shoulders back and forth as if considering it, “except maybe a nice MLC, a mutton, lettuce, and cheese sandwich, especially if you’ve got nice lean mutton, and the good, _gooey_ kind of cheese, which—” he grinned at the thought of it, eyes closing in pleasure, “_I love that._”

Then remembering his train of thought, his eyes opened again, and his voice raised.

“But! That’s not what she said. She _very_ clearly said ‘To blave,’ which, as we all know, means ‘to bluff,’ so you were _probably_ just playing cards, and then she _cheated—_

“You liar!” came a woman’s voice from the back, as a woman stormed in.

She was shorter than him, with dark brown, weather-beaten skin, and shining blue eyes. Judging by the wrinkles on her face, it looked like she spent most of her time smiling, but she wasn’t smiling now.

“Ohhh ho no you don’t,” said Plagg, his hand crackling with the same dark lightning. _“Get away from me, witch.”_

With a speed that belied her appearance, the woman’s hand snapped out, and wrapped around his wrist, strangling the lightning.

_“I’m not a witch,”_ she said, less angry, and more… violently disappointed. “I’m your _wife._ But after what you just said, I’m not sure I want to be _that_ anymore.”

“Oh, so you were _listening in, then._”

_“True love,”_ she said, “she said _true love,_ Plagg, how _dare_ you pretend otherwise, when we both know how much love _means_ to you—

Plagg tried to pull away, and failed. _“Shut up, Tikki.”_

Her grip vicelike, Tikki turned to the two of them.

“He refuses to admit that he even knows what love _is, _since what happened with Roberts.”

_“Tikki,”_ said Plagg, voice almost dangerous.

She spun to face him. “You gave your ring away without even _consulting_ with me, Plagg! I think I get to do this!”

“He was charismatic, dashing, and in love!” said Plagg, “those were pretty much my top three qualifications! How was I supposed to know he _wasn’t_ in love!?”

_“Your first tip should have been the piracy!”_ said Tikki.

She turned back to them, rolling her eyes.

“As if _that_ wasn’t enough, now he’s bitter because Gabriel decided to ruin our reputation, so any _progress_ he’d made—

_“Why’d you say that name? You promised me you’d never say that name!”_

“What? _Gabriel?”_ said Tikki.

Plagg groaned, cringing away from her.

“Gabriel? Is Gabriel the name you don’t want to hear?”

He managed to break away, and started walking rapidly away, shaking his head.

“There is a woman who needs our help, and you don’t even have the decency to say _why_ you won’t help!”

He put his hands over his ears. _“I’m not listening!”_

_“Gabriel.”_ Repeated Tikki, saying the name like it was a curse. _“Gabriel!”_

Alya, finally managing to recover her train of thought, cut in.

_“The true love she’s talking about is Adrien! If you heal her, she’ll stop the wedding.”_

_“Gabriel!”_ said Tikki, one more time, before Plagg had a hand over her mouth.

_“Wait,”_ he said, and turned to Alya.

“Wait. Wait, I heal her, Gabriel suffers?”

_“Guaranteed,”_ said Alya.

“This is Marinette!?” said Tikki, eyes widening as she looked down. “I thought they'd let her go!”

_"Adrien did,” _said Plagg, bitterly, _"as soon as they got out of the fire swamp."_

_“They would have killed him otherwise!” _said Tikki.

Plagg groaned. “Yeah. That’s what _he_ said.”

He turned away from them, fists clenched at his side.

"Wait... You... Know her? You know Adrien?"

"I've spent... More food at her parents' bakery than I should, and Adrien... Well, he went out riding a lot, I think. He happened to pass by once or twice, and I invited him in to talk."

_"_Yeah_," _said Plagg, "and he definitely talked long enough. Kept chattering on about... Well, _apparently_ about _her,_" he gestured down at... At the woman who was apparently Marinette. "I swear, he was here for an _hour_, just talking about her."

"You say that like you didn't cry yourself to sleep that night because it was so beautiful!" said Tikki.

"I told you! I stayed inside so long that the dust got buried in my eye! _I wasn't crying."_

He turned away, and started for the back of the hovel.

“Come on, Plagg," called Tikki, "you can give love one more chance, right?”

He stopped, dead, and seemed to sag, as if there was a weight on his back.

There was a long silence.

_“And…” _said Tikki, “if nothing else… you’ll get to mess with Gabriel.”

Another few seconds passed, in relative silence.

“Well…” Said Plagg, eventually. “What did I say? For a noble cause? And… That _is_ certainly a noble cause."

He spun around. "Give me the money, I’m on the job.”

Tikki practically cheered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This. This is the chapter that I've been wanting to write for ages.  
Plagg as Miracle Max is just so much fun to me, and Tikki makes an excellent Valerie.  
And, as an added bonus, the astute among you will be able to pick up a few pieces of fun backstory.


	17. Miracle Pill

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Plagg and Tikki concoct a miracle pill... More of a miracle lump, really.  
Alya and Nino evaluate what they're up against.

It had been maybe another 15 or so minutes, which the miracle workers had spent mixed, heating, and combining strange powders and leaves.

The result…

The result was, in short, a _lump, _maybe half the size of a fist, which Tikki was carefully coating in something dark.

“So… That’s a miracle pill?” said Alya, a bit dubiously.

Plagg nodded.

“The chocolate coating makes it go down easier,” said Tikki, “But you’ll still need to wait fifteen minutes for full potency. Plagg?”

Plagg nodded, and took the lump in his hand.

Tikki, as he held it palm up, placed her own hand on top of it.

“And she shouldn’t go swimming for, what?”

“An hour,” said Plagg.

There was a sensation in the air, and Tikki’s earrings shimmered unnaturally. The lump seemed to shudder nervously in their hands, affected by powers that neither Alya nor Nino fully understood.

“At _least_ an hour,” said Tikki, removing her hand, and extracting a small bag.

Plagg placed the pill in the bag, and Tikki cinched it shut.

“And make sure she comes back here when you’re done; I need to talk to her about her ring.”

“And bring Nathalie’s Miraculous along,” added Tikki, “We should be able to fix it _properly_ if we have the ring.”

Alya, trying not to fidget too much, after how long she’d been waiting, took the pill.

“Thank you for everything,” she said, heading for the door.

“Yeah, yeah,” said Plagg, waving her off.

“You left your friend behind,” said Tikki, and Nino doubled back, to lead Marinette outside.

And in a second, they were on their way.

“Bye-bye, you two!”

“Have fun storming the castle.”

\--

“You think it’ll work?”

“Well, it _would_ take a miracle.”

Plagg laughed.

\--

The sun was almost to the horizon as they finally got in sight of the castle, positioned neatly behind a bit of wall that hadn’t seen use in years.

“So, Alya, bit of an issue; you remember how I said there were 30 guards? I think it’s gotten worse.”

“That’s fine,” said Alya, trying to wrangle Marinette into a sitting position, up against the wall. _“How did he make her sit still?”_

Nino looked over at her, a little concerned. “I mean, probably a miracle or something, but seriously, dude, it’s like _60_ guards now.”

_“We’ve got her,”_ said Alya, “I’m going to need some help; she’s not going to take this willingly.”

“Has it been 15 minutes?”

“It’s been at _least_ 10,” said Alya, “and we’re running out of time. The wedding’s in half an hour, and our _best_ bet is going to be to strike beforehand, while everyone’s distracted.”

“Alright dude, it’s your revenge quest,” said Nino, shrugging, and maneuvering Marinette into a sitting position.

“Keep her arms pinned.”

Nino nodded.

Alya squeezed the corners of her jaws, pulled her mouth open.

“How long do we wait before we know if it works?”

“Your guess is as good as mine,” said Alya, dropping the lump into her mouth, and forcing her jaw shut. She swallowed. “Probably another 10, 15—"

There was a loud, aggravated yowling, and Alya rapidly took a strike to her arm, and fell back, as Marinette leapt to her feet.

There was a moment where she was hissing, yammering unintelligibly, but seemingly with a great deal of feeling. She stepped forward, hand raised—

And fell flat on her face.

“Seconds,” said Nino, “You were going to say _seconds,_ right?”

“Uh… Yeah,” said Alya, “let’s pretend I was.”

On the ground, Marinette was still hissing, but this time, the sound was coming from her body as a whole, which seemed to be under a great deal of stress, twisting, and… _shifting._

Alya leaned to the side, and, looking around the wall, was relieved to see that the guards hadn’t taken any notice of them.

“So… Miracle pill, huh?”

“Yeah…” said Nino, “I’ve got to say; living up to its name.”

A few more seconds passed, and…

Then it was the woman they’d fought, lying face-down on the ground, unmoving.

“You don’t suppose it killed her,” said Alya after a second.

“I don’t have the money for another miracle,” said Nino.

Alya flipped her over.

There was a gasp, as she sucked in a breath.

For a second, they just looked at each other.

Marinette blinked.

“Why won’t my arms move?”

Alya shrugged. “Guess reversing a transformation like yours takes it out of you.”

“We had a pair of miracle workers make a pill to turn you back into a human,” said Nino.

Her eyebrows furrowed. “That makes things _less_ clear. We’ve met, haven’t we? Are we still enemies? Why am I on the ground?” Her eyes flashed. “Where’s Adrien?”

“Let me explain,” said Alya, smiling. Her smile faltered, and she glanced away. “Actually, there’s too much. Let me sum up.”

“Adrien’s getting married in a little less than half an hour, so all we need to do is break up the wedding, get him out of there, and then escape after I finish my own quest.”

“Which is?” She blinked. “Don’t answer that; You want to take Nathalie’s Miraculous; I remember.”

Alya nodded.

“You said half an hour? It doesn’t leave much time to wait around.”

“Was that you moving your hand?” said Nino, “Good for you, dude.”

“Yeah, I’m a quick healer,” said Marinette, “What are we up against?”

“There’s only one working gate,” said Alya, hauling Marinette vertically, and pointing her around the wall. “And it’s got 60 guards, most of which are probably empowered by Gabriel’s Miraculous.”

“And on _our_ side?”

“The two of us, and your brains.”

“That’s it?” said Marinette, more exasperated than anything else. “Impossible! I mean… I’ve fought both of you, you’re not _weak_ by any stretch, but… Maybe if I had my strength back enough to get us through a wall, or _something, _but as it stands…” she shook her head.

“Well hey,” said Nino, “you shook your head at least. That’s got to be worth something, right?”

“My plan and _two people_ against sixty enemies. I’ll need a bit more than the ability to shake my head to make it out alive, _let alone_ get Adrien out with me. Now, if we had some tools… Some forged papers, maybe some fancy clothes; even a _wheelbarrow_ would give me _something_ to build on.” She sighed. “I’m going to die at this rate, and the last thing my parents will hear about me is that I tried to crash a wedding.”

“Well…” said Alya, “I don’t know about the clothes or the papers, but we did take the wheelbarrow the man from the pit of despair was carrying you in. It’s… What, back with Plagg and Tikki?”

Marinette sighed. “Listen; we’re in a position where we can’t afford to forget about _any_ of our assets. Do we have anything else?”

“I mean… it’s kind of included in the fact that you have the two of us, but illusions and Nino’s barrier?”

“Right… Illusions,” said Marinette. “Okay… Get the wheelbarrow; I’ve got some thinking to do.”


	18. Here for Your Soul

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The wedding proceeds.  
The castle is stormed.
> 
> Alya finally makes progress.

“You seem unexcited, Adrien.”

“Should I be?”

Nathalie placed a band of gold around his neck.

“I believe it’s common before weddings.”

Adrien looked down, saw the soft white of his clothes, the simple, gleaming gold of jewelry that seemed to wrap around him like chains, a cross between offering to the Gilded Kingdom, and wedding attire.

He sighed, feeling like nothing more than a sacrifice.

“It’s only a wedding if I’m married at the end of it.”

For a second, he could feel Nathalie stop behind him, before the clink of metal told him that she’d continued on her quest to make him… Well, to make him _Gilded._

“And…” he said, “Marinette _will_ come for me.”

Nathalie didn’t respond to that.

\--

Marinette strained to keep herself upright as they looked out over the gate one last time.

“Alright,” she said, “so, we’re ready?”

There was a moment where the three of them just looked at each other.

For a second, Alya seemed struck by something, and then… She held out her hand, and Nino took it.

“Nino,” she said, softly, “I just… I wanted to say thank you, before we did this. Between the three of us, you’re the only one who doesn’t have a personal reason to do this.”

Nino laughed.

“Like hell I don’t, dude. _Someone’s_ gotta make sure you get out of this alive.”

“Hah…” said Alya, and swallowed heavily.

The moment was broken slightly, as Marinette finally got enough horizontal momentum to launch her hand on top of the other two.

\--

The chapel had been swept clean of every _speck_ of dust, and artfully lit so that every piece of glass created beautiful patterns of shimmering light on the walls.

Adrien knelt before the Officiant. Beside him, though he barely registered her, was Chloe, who, despite not wearing as much gold jewelry as him, seemed to have it woven through everything she wore. He hadn’t really been able to tell what she’d felt about the whole marriage; certainly, she hadn’t said much to _him,_ but he’d heard rumors that she’d been nitpicking things even more than usual. Maybe the rumors about her and her handmaid were true.

But… Either way, it wasn’t his concern; he wasn’t getting married tonight. Not to her.

He looked up at the officiant, almost defiant.

Beatifically, the officiant out across the crowd, and began.

_“Mawwiage. Mawwiage is what bwings us togethwer, today.”_

Adrien didn’t know where they’d gotten this man.

_“Mawwiage, that bwessed awwangement, that dweam… wiffim a dweam….”_

Listening past the truly remarkable speech impediment, Adrien made out the sound that he’d been looking for.

There was something happening outside.

\--

_“Stand your ground,”_ he said, _“stand your ground._ Gabriel will have your heads if you run.”

True or not, he needed _something_ to keep the from running away from…

It was like a ghost; a dark figure in the distance, seeming to float towards them.

And then, the voice seemed to come to them from all directions, as the figure raised an ominous hand to them.

_“I am the nine-lived pirate,”_ she said, and laughed, more of a menacing chuckle. _“I do not leave survivors.”_

There was a mighty stir in the crowd at that.

An infamous pirate, holder of a deadly, destructive miraculous.

_“I am here, and my crew follows me. Where then, will you be when they arrive? Already dead by my hands? Or will they get to feast on your still flowing blood?”_

A particularly small guard, seemingly cracking under the stress, ran forward, slipping past her fellows, towards the newly arrived pirate, screaming wildly.

_“Bravery, then,” _said the Nine-Lived One. _“Admirable, but…”_ she waved a hand, and before their eyes, there was a crackle of black lightning, and the guard fell to her knees, and… disintegrated. _“foolish.”_

At the word, a few of the less iron-willed guards bolted, including one or two of the ones Gabriel had empowered.

\--

Gabriel whispered something urgently to Nathalie, and she nodded, solemnly, and left the room, taking another four guards with her.

\--

_“I have come for your souls!”_ she called, and at the word, the same black lightning that she had mustered before crackled all around her.

More guards ran, and then, the panic set in, and the crowd scattered.

She just laughed, the sound trailing after them, as the chief enforcer tried, unsuccessfully, to rally his troops. 

\--

Adrien smiled serenely; maybe the proceedings would have run short, as some trick of his father’s, but it didn’t matter. Marinette would be here soon.

_“And now, the wing,”_ said the Officiant, and before Adrien even had a chance to protest, Chloe had slipped it neatly onto his finger.

_“It is mowwe than a wing, it is a pwomise. A pwomise, to wuv, and to chewwish. To-_

\--

As the men scattered, not even looking back, the floating figure seemed to flicker slightly, and the Chief Enforcer’s eyes widened, even as he pushed his back to the gate. Underneath her, a wheelbarrow seemed to flicker into view, and she jumped easily down from it, her clothes rapidly fading from black into orange. Had he been paying attention, he might even have spotted a pile of dust behind her ceasing to exist.

He pressed back, hoping he was thin enough that the portcullis-

“Nino, keep the portcullis up.”

“Mhm,” came a man’s voice, and there was suddenly a green, shimmering barrier, stopping the portcullis from coming down.

\--

Alya, grinning, pushed forward.

“Give us the gate key,” said Marinette, as Nino pulled her from the back of the wheelbarrow, which he had been pushing.

“I have no gate key,” he said, seeming uncertain.

“Nino, put a barrier in his stomach and expand it until he blows up.”

Nino shrugged, and stretched his fingers out, directing them approximately at the man’s chest.

“Oh, you mean _this_ gate key,” said the man hurriedly, pulling out a gate key.

\--

_Surely, she had to come. He’d heard Father’s whisper, caught the trace of fear in his eyes. _

_“And so… Foww the good of aww peopoww, I hewwby pwocwaim, by ve powwew invwested in me, that you, Adwien, and you, Chwwoe, awe man, and wifwe.”_

He blinked.

It was over?

Almost instantly, there was a strong hand on his back.

_“Escort him to his room,”_ said his father. _“I’ll be there momentarily to confirm the plans for tomorrow.”_

The guard who’d stepped up to him pushed steadily, and he was being guided away.

“She… She didn’t make it.”

\--

Alya was leading now, her flute spinning end over end in her hand, nervous, almost frantic now.

Nino, with Marinette over one shoulder, was following as quickly as he could, and then…

Alya froze.

As he caught up to her, he saw why.

In front of her was… four guards, but… In the middle of them…

Nathalie looked between the two of them.

“Leave one of them alive for questioning. I don’t care which one.”

And then her eyes caught on Marinette.

“Hello again, Nathalie,” said Marinette, pleasantly. “I imagine you're surprised to see me again so soon.”

And then… Something strange happened.

A smile spread across Nathalie’s face. It didn’t suit her.

“Change of plans. She’s the only one we need alive.”


	19. 'My Name Is Alya Cesaire...'

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nathalie cost her her father.  
She wants him back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sadly, that version of the line feels slightly less punchy than the original, but 'you killed my father, prepare to die,' is wrong on a minimum of one front.

The guards nodded, solemnly, and rushed forward, already swinging.

They only made it a few steps before-

Alya _blurred, _hands slashing wildly, with no regard for their weapons.

The last one was falling before the first had hit the ground.

Nathalie looked at her, only the barest hint of nerves showing.

Alya, claws flexing at her side, stared her down.

_“Hello. My name is Alya Cesaire. You cost me my father. I want him back.”_

For a long, long second, Nathalie said nothing, eyes flicking back and forth between the three of them, and then down at the guards on the ground.

Then without a word, she turned, and _ran._

Alya, in all her thoughts of what might have happened when she’d reached the end of her quest, had never expected that.

She chased. Down a hall, around a corner, and suddenly Nathalie had slipped horizontally, through a door, and it slipped shut.

Alya shifted course, slamming her body against the door.

It didn’t move.

\--

_“Nino?”_ called Alya frantically, as there was a sound of slamming, as of someone’s fists against a heavy wooden door. _“Nino, I need you!”_

“I can’t just leave her alone, dude.”

_“She’s getting away from me. Please, Nino.”_

“I’ll be right back, dude,” said Nino, propping Marinette up against a wall.

He ran off, around the corner, and-

“Oh, gotcha,” he said, “stand back.”

Alya did.

He stepped into the middle of the hall, and with a silent apology to the architecture, created a barrier around himself.

Then, with an effort, the bubble expanded, bits of stonework cracked, and most importantly…

He focused a bit more, and the door practically _popped_ open.

He dropped the barrier.

_“Thank you,”_ said Alya, the words barely a breath as she rushed passed.

_“Go get her, dude, I’ve just gotta get Marinette.”_

\--

Adrien walked softly, mind churning through what had just happened.

The commotion outside, and his father’s fear… Those couldn’t have been fake, could they? But then, if Marinette hadn’t shown up, what had he been afraid of?

The idea that she might have lost, or… Or been killed… It didn’t make sense. She’d already survived certain death once, she wouldn’t have died _now_.

He had to find her.

Whatever had happened, he needed to find her, and he couldn’t do that from inside the castle.

\--

Nino crossed his arms.

“That’s definitely not right,” he muttered to himself.

Marinette was gone.

There had been no sounds of a struggle, no… _Anything._

Well… If she was off following her own path, then he didn’t know where to find her.

Alya, meanwhile…

\--

It didn’t seem like Nathalie had expected her to be able to break through, which meant that Alya was still close behind, and gaining rapidly.

_Almost. Almost._

Nathalie pushed through another door, and bolted right.

Alya barely slowed, and twisted into a horizontal slide, slamming the door wide open.

She was in a dining hall, at the top of a set of stairs.

Nathalie had jumped the railing and taken the fast way down, and Alya wasn’t about to let that give her any advantage.

She leaped.

And then…

Time seemed to slow down, as she realized that Nathalie hadn’t been running when she’d entered. She’d been turned around down at ground level, facing back at her.

There was a flash of silver in her hand, and Alya’s eyes widened as a knife flew towards her.

She twisted, trying to avoid it, but-

She landed, and staggered, the knife, which had given her a nasty gash in the stomach, but nothing fatal, falling to the ground.

She straightened up, far from finished, and-

There was a sickeningly familiar sensation in her stomach.

_“No,” _she muttered, _‘not again. Not…”_

_\--_

It was… A minute ago.

Nino had only barely made it through the door when he’d been ambushed by Gabriel’s guards.

“You know,” he said, “I’d rather not fight. I’m just trying to get to my friend.”

“Oh, we know,” said one of them, that purple glimmer in her eyes. “Who knows; maybe Ms. Nathalie will bring back what’s left of her before we’re done with you.”

“Well…” said Nino, easily shifting his shield onto one arm, “I’ll be honest with you, I think you have it backwards. My guess is that Alya might bring back her before I’m done with _you.”_

“It’s six against one.”

He smiled, cracking his neck.

“Well, I’ve always been at my best when I’m fighting against groups.”

\--

Nathalie was keeping the force weak, but still strong enough to make it difficult to stand.

“I _do_ remember you,” she said. “I had _considered_ that you might seek revenge, but, well, 4, 5 years later is longer than I expected.”

Alya struggled.

“I had _wanted_ to finish the job, and transform you fully, but… Your father would have torn my throat out… Still, it’s always annoyed me to leave a job unfinished, so, I’m glad you finally came back.”

\--

As the guard closed the door behind him, Adrien closed his eyes, and tried to _breathe._

Okay.

He needed to leave. _Tonight._

He walked to his desk.

_Should he leave a letter? Or… Surely Father would know why he’d left. He’d probably come track him down again, but that didn’t matter; he’d just leave again._

His fists clenched at his sides, his resolve building.

_Right._

He started pulling off gold. The bracelets, _gone._ The band around his neck, _gone._ The ring… He pulled it off, and gave it a pained look.

He sighed, and put it-

“I’d always wanted one like that.”

He spun.

There, lying peacefully on his bed, was Marinette.

Adrien almost froze.

“M… Marinette?”

He stepped towards her, legs shaking.

Her expression was the almost sad smile of someone whose waiting has finally ended.

“Hello, Adrien.”

He made it to the side of the bed.

Her hand rose up to meet his.

“I’m sorry for not getting up, but… It’s been a rough day.”

\--

“You’re still trying to win, then?” said Nathalie.

Alya shuffled to her feet, the claws on her hand now _truly_ claws, rather than overdeveloped fingernails.

“I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised,” said Nathalie, “I believe those claws were built from your own defiance; you don’t have a choice besides resisting.”

She sighed. “Well… I suppose I don’t have the luxury of using you as my next subject. Goodbye, Alya Cesaire.”

The fan twisted with fractured, strange energy, and Alya’s teeth seemed a little sharper, a little longer.

_“Alya… Alya Cesaire,”_ she said.

Nathalie was almost impressed. Perhaps she’d need to induce defiance in her next subject to make them more resistant.

She’d need to disregard the pain, and finish this properly.

_“Hello. My name is Alya Cesaire,” _she said, staggering forward, eyes wild, _“You cost me my father. I want him back.”_

She pushed again, the pain burning in twisted, jagged lines up her arm, but it seemed even less effective than the last time.

_“Hello,” she repeated, the stagger turning into a stumbling run, “My name is Alya Cesaire. You cost me my father. I want him back.”_

Nathalie was backing away, now, the pain of her Miraculous reaching into her chest, now, finally strong enough to make her feel something again.

_“Stop saying that!” _she yelled, somewhere between anger and fear.

_“Hello!” Alya practically screamed, advancing like an oncoming storm. ”My name is Alya Cesaire! You cost me my father! I want him back!”_

And, the pain wrapping up her neck, now, Alya right hand slashed out, and the fan flew from her hand.

Nathalie looked to the side, as Alya’s hand wrapped around her neck, and slammed her to the wall.

_“So here we are,”_ she said, her voice a snarl.

Nathalie managed to nod.

_“What now?”_ Said Alya. _“I take your Miraculous, of course, that’s obvious, but then what?”_

_Her hand slipped out, and she pulled the fan away from Nathalie’s chest._

_“Would you ask for mercy?”_

_“Please.”_

_“And what would you offer me in exchange?”_ she said, pinning the miraculous onto herself. _“Money, maybe?”_

_“Yes.”_

_“Power too, I imagine,” _said Alya, letting the transformation from her miraculous drop, showing the extent to which her body had shifted into a more… _predatory_ shape.

_“I have a great deal, and I would willingly acquire more to give you.”_

_“Offer me anything I ask for.”_

_“You may have anything you desire, if you just let me go,” _said Nathalie.

Then… There was a shift in her appearance again, and Nathalie recognized the transformation of her own miraculous.

Alya growled. _“You should have thought of that before you crystalized every vengeful urge you could find.”_

And the fan _burned, _and Nathalie felt only a moment of terror, before that moment of terror stretched, onwards, outwards, towards eternity.

\--

Nino, bruised, cut, but triumphant, sprinted down the hall.

He wouldn’t have been in such a rush, but he was pretty sure he recognized an unnatural sound when he heard it, and what he was hearing right now…

He stopped, at the top of a set of stairs.

There, across the room, was a woman, who must have been Nathalie without her Miraculous, and…

The figure that had her pressed to the wall slid her to the side, and let her drop like a sack of flour.

Nathalie scrambled away, and she looked… Strange. She was pale, and seemed to be flickering, as if there were two of her overlapping.

Then, as she turned, he recognized Alya, just as he’d expected.

The transformation dropped, and… she still looked strange.

“And who knows,” she said, “maybe I’ll decide I’m not satisfied yet. You’d better watch your back!”

Nathalie burst through the door, and out of sight.

Nino took the stairs down.

Alya, completely untransformed for the first time he could remember in months, turned to look at him as he started getting close.

Well… Not completely untransformed. Not even untransformed by a Miraculous.

She managed a smile, which was more unnerving than anything, with the way the bones in her skull had shifted.

“Honestly,” he said, “I’m surprised you let her live.”

“I had to leave something left to feel what had happened to her,” said Alya.

“Which is…?”

“She made me eternally defiant,” said Alya, “I’ve made her eternally fearful.”

“So… She really got you, huh?”

“I suppose,” she said, shrugging, “But if Plagg was right, and I bet he was, I can put myself back together. Or… I don’t know whether I could use it on myself. Maybe I’ll have to get someone else to do it.”

“Ha,” said Nino, “well… Count me in, dude.”

She laughed, lightly. “Thanks, Nino.”

They stood there, for a minute.

“Well…” said Nino, “You’ve got the Miraculous, you got your revenge. How do you feel?”

Alya thought about it.

“If I leave aside the burning desire for more revenge, and push past the fact that I got a knife to the stomach… I feel pretty good.”


	20. Face To Face

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Marinette meets Adrien again, and comes face to face with Gabriel Agreste for the second time.

_“Marinette, I’m so sorry,”_ said Adrien, his forehead pressed against hers.

Marinette managed a laugh that was barely more than a breath.

_“What hideous sin have you committed, lately?”_ she asked, and he could feel the warmth of her breath on his chin as she spoke.

“Well…” he said, and almost couldn’t continue, but… “I got married. I… I didn’t mean to, but the ring was on my finger, and… Apparently the Gilded Kingdom doesn’t need an ‘I do…’”

“Adrien…” she said, softly. “I don’t care.”

He blinked, and looked at her.

She smiled. “For the past two years, I’ve been the most feared pirate on the seas. I’ve had fleets chase me down to kill me, and they’ve never managed it. Refusing to accept what’s supposedly a lawful marriage… It barely even registers at this point. For that matter, it’s probably _less_ lawful to have broken in tonight. Wouldn’t you agree, Gabriel?”

“I have no intent of needing to make the comparison,” said Gabriel, transformed into the purple of his Miraculous, sword in hand. “This will be to the death.”

“Oh…” said Marinette, and she seemed disappointed. “I wish.”

“You wish?”

“I wish I could kill you, but I wouldn’t subject Adrien to the sight of his own father’s death, nor could I live with myself if I knew that every time he looked at me, he knew I had killed you.”

“Then this fight will be over quickly.”

Marinette laughed, as Adrien backed away. “Oh, I never said I wouldn’t fight. No… What I intend to do might be even _worse_ than death, to you.”

Gabriel raised his eyebrows. “Do tell.”

Marinette smiled.

“The first thing will be taking your Miraculous. Obviously.”

“Of course,” said Gabriel.

“And then… Then I make you regret making it obvious that you recognized me.”

“Excuse me?”

“Back in the fire swamp. Don’t you remember? You said I’d been ‘sabotaging’ you. Except, you seemed to have forgotten that the orders you sent to your operatives were _written._ Specifically, they were _carrying_ their orders. Meticulously dated, code-named, but easily traced back to the source, if you knew where to look. And now I do. The pirate ship Revenge has almost 3 years of your orders. At least, those that we _found._ Nathalie’s name shows up once or twice. You should probably have kept it encoded.”

Gabriel’s expression had soured.

“Every underhanded, backstabbing, treacherous bargain, assassination, or theft that you’ve made, all perfectly documented.”

“I made the mistake of not finishing you myself, last time. Not this time.”

“Ah- Father? What are you—

“Silence, Adrien.”

He gathered himself.

“What then? You depose me, discredit me, _then_ what? You leave this country as an annex of the Gilded Kingdom? You let it collapse? What skill do you have for leadership?”

“I’ve spent the past two years leading people into fights they aren’t guaranteed to survive. I’ve spent the past five learning to be calm, calculating, and charismatic,” said Marinette, almost mockingly. “Adrien’s spent his whole life learning to be royal. Add a few trustworthy advisors, and I’m sure we’ll figure something out.”

There was a long moment of silence, and then…

There was a shift in the way Gabriel held his shoulders, and he inclined his head slightly_. _

“You should have come back 3 months ago. You might have convinced me.”

“I should never have left; you’re not worth convincing.”

“Not even to convince me that you can fight?” asked Gabriel, shifting his grip on his sword, “_You’re bluffing._ You’ve barely moved since I’ve entered the room.”

“It’s possible,” said Marinette, still motionless. “I might be bluffing. Maybe, I decided that the best way to die to the very definition of a villain was after putting a bit of fear in his chest. Maybe I’m only lying here because I lack the strength to stand…”

Finally, she reached down, and extracted her baton.

“Then again…” she groaned, sitting up, “maybe I was buying myself time to recover my strength. Maybe you fell for it.”

She rose, ponderously, and Gabriel’s eyes widened, and he uneasily took a step away.

And then, she was on her feet. 

She lightly flipped the baton to her other hand, and in the newly freed one…

There was a crackle of dark, burning lightning.

“I seem to recall hearing that you saw what was left of Lila?” she said. Gabriel gave her a searching look, and she smiled. “I think even _Adrien_ would forgive me if you… _forced my hand._”

The smile dropped, and her expression was suddenly deadly serious.

_“Hand over your Miraculous.”_

And then… Even Gabriel, with all the anger in his eyes, with all the control he tried to have over his emotions, couldn’t quite hide the fear in his eyes.

He reached up, and… pulled the Miraculous away.

The sword vanished. The purple vanished, and he was once again in the formal clothes he’d been wearing to the wedding.

"Drop it."

He did.

“Now. Sit down,” said Marinette.

He did.

said Marinette, “the issue becomes how to tie you up. I can’t trust you to tie yourself up, and I wouldn’t ask Adrien to do it, and _nobody_ wants _me_ to do it…” she glanced at the storm in her hand, “I’d need both hands.”

The door opened, and the question was handily defused as Alya and Nino pushed inside.

They looked around.

“I see things went well,” said Alya, clearly the worse for the wear, but still standing tall.

“Oh, hey, dude,” said Nino to Adrien, “been a bit, huh?”

“I… I suppose it has been,” said Adrien, slightly unnerved at the sight of his former captors.

“So…” said Marinette, “I don’t suppose one of you could take him outside, could you?”

Alya and Nino looked at each other.

“Yeah sure,” said Nino, and with the ease of a giant, pulled his unstoppably upwards, and out of the room.

Alya followed him.

And then…

“Well,” said Marinette.

“Well.”

“So? What now?”

“I…” said Marinette. “I don’t know. I had half an hour maximum to plan this, and I was mostly worried about getting _in._ I had vaguely considered doing the thing where I made a dramatic entrance and ruined the wedding, but…”

She let out a breath, and her legs shuddered underneath her.

Adrien bolted forward, narrowly managing to stop her from falling.

_“I’m not sure I’m up to that tonight,”_ she said.

“No,” said Adrien, “it’s okay, we can… we can…” he looked around, and managed to flop her over onto his bed. “We can handle it in the morning.”

As she landed, she let out the groan of extended tension finally released.

“Right,” she said, “that’s… yeah… In the morning.”

“Listen…” she said, “I’m just going to… Just… Take a nap, okay?”

“Yeah,” he said, “I’ll be here.”

She managed to laugh, weakly. “All that work to rescue you, and now you’re looking after me.”

“Yeah, well… I’m sure you’d look after me if _I_ couldn’t move.”

She smiled, eyes closed, and something in her face told him that she was already almost asleep.

That was fine.

This was fine.

It was all a mess, yes, but… He had Marinette with him, now.

Almost idly, he looked down at the Miraculous in his hand.

His hand clenched around it.

_Nobody was going to pull them apart again; _he knew that with the certainty of someone who didn’t care what the truth was supposed to be. He’d _make_ it the truth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Turns out, the alterations from the original makes it a lot messier. They can't just ride of into the sunset in this one, is the major issue, of course.
> 
> In other news, those of you who've been around for a while might recognize a sidelong joke about The Medusa Challenge. (We finally got that role reversal, even if it's not actually the focus of the story.)
> 
> Next chapter should be the last one, for reference.


	21. The End

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The fallout of that night leaves a mess, and one that will probably take years to be truly finished, but they'll handle it together.

It took Adrien another hour to fall asleep.

He locked the door, and the window, took off the rest of the gold jewelry, which took the better part of 15 minutes.

And when he was finally out of easy, thoughtless things to pass the time, his mind refused to let him rest.

There had been too much. Too much to think through, and altogether too many surprises.

There had been the wedding, where he’d known Marinette would show up, but then she hadn’t, and then he’d been about to run away, but then she _had_ shown up, and then his father had shown up, and they hadn’t even fought, but she’d still won_,_ and he hadn’t even denied what she said he’d done, and…

In the end, the desire for sleep finally washed away the worry, and he fell asleep at his desk.

\--

The next day was a mess for Adrien and Marinette; it had to be, after everything that had happened.

The brute squad, surprisingly, was the least of their issues. They’d been loyal to Gabriel, yes, but when someone successfully sends you running for the hills without even touching you, the only choices are respect, and hatred, and for all their strength, they weren’t foolhardy.

Besides, Gabriel _and _Nathalie were gone, which meant that Marinette and Adrien, by virtue of defeating them and being the logical next in command, had every right to command them, one way or the other.

In fact, Marinette had almost thought things would go smoothly…

And then they’d tried to deal with the wedding.

Marinette had expected that once it became apparent that the person they’d made the deal with was no longer in control, that the Gilded Kingdom would back down, but…

Well, suffice to say that while Chloe seemed to be carefully concealing her relief, _Audrey_, her mother, would have gladly gotten her revenge.

She could have disintegrated her, which was a fact that Audrey seemed utterly incapable of acknowledging. Whether it was a matter of political savviness, knowing that Marinette _wouldn’t_ do it, or a stubborn resistance to any acknowledgement of her own weakness.

Marinette had finally been preparing to accept that negotiations might be interminably long.

And then Adrien had almost been shot.

Marinette had done her best to chase down the would-be assassin, but to no avail, as they rapidly seemed to _vanish._

Setting the brute squad on the investigation, she’d finally returned to the negotiations, almost exhausted at the mere idea of keeping this up for weeks, until she’d seen the expression on Audrey’s face.

And then she realized what she’d apparently just seen.

_A botched assassination by the Gilded Kingdom._

Audrey had fervently denied any involvement in the attempt, and had taken great offense at the implication, but it didn’t matter; the negotiations had shifted in Marinette’s favor after that, and by the end of the day, the wedding had been annulled.

_It was only later that the assassin showed up to demand payment from her, since Gabriel wasn’t around to give it. That had been another story entirely, though._

\--

Alya and Nino, meanwhile, had gone back to the miracle workers with Nathalie’s Miraculous.

Tikki, of course, had cheerily welcomed them back, and even Plagg seemed to be concealing a good mood.

They couldn’t do any more to fix the Miraculous than they’d done the last time they’d seen it, but Alya was a different story.

\--

“Lie down,” said Plagg, as Tikki held the fan lightly in her hands.

Alya did so, as Tikki turned the fan over in her hands, with the gentle precision of an expert.

“I almost forgot how badly broken it was,” said Tikki, softly. “She should never have been using it.”

“Yeah, well, the sooner I get my ring back, the sooner we can have it _actually_ working,” said Plagg, taking a clinical look at Alya’s forearm.

“I’m sure we can make do in the meantime,” said Tikki, and the fan shimmered lightly in her hands.

“Are you ready, Plagg?”

He cracked his neck. “Yeah. Now, get comfortable; we’re gonna be here a while.”

\--

It took more than an hour, but by the end of it, Alya was back to her normal self.

And… It _was _her normal self. The real, original one. The claws were gone, and, when they walked back to the castle, nobody would have given them even a sidelong glance.

And, the next day, when all four of them returned one more time with the ring, Adrien was the only one that would have drawn attention.

And, almost two weeks later, after Alya and Nino had finally set off with the Miraculous in tow, and the delegation from the Gilded Kingdom had finally left, and successfully sharing the information that Marinette had compiled, unknowingly, and she’d _finally_ gotten to properly go home and say hello to her parents…

They were tired.

Tired, but finally, the world around them had fallen silent.

\--

Marinette pushed the door open.

“Well,” she said, looking around, “I’ve got to say, it’s a lot _dustier_ than I remember.”

Adrien laughed, a bit abashed. “Well… It felt _wrong_ to just hire someone else to clean, since… That was your job, but…” He sighed. “I’ve been cleaning it myself. Or, I _had_ been.”

“So the rich boy pulls out a broom when he’s alone?” said Marinette, elbowing him lightly.

“Well…” said Adrien, “I wouldn’t say I was exactly _good_ at it. More… amateur than anything.”

“I doubt I was much better,” she said, walking further inside. “It’s also… _A lot smaller_ than I remember.”

“Well, I think you were smaller at the time,” said Adrien.

“I suppose I was,” she agreed, “not to mention that I’ve been out to sea for years. Everything else seems small by comparison.”

“It would, wouldn’t it…” said Adrien, pausing behind her, not quite following her out the back door.

She stood there, in the light of the sunset, her long braid swinging behind her…

He stood there, and watched for a second.

“Adrien?” she said, turning around, “is something wrong?”

“Oh…” he said, “it’s nothing, just… You’ve been out in the world, learning, and growing, and… And I’ve just been sitting here. Doing nothing. You did all this _stuff_ to get back to me, and now… I’m just not sure it was worth it.”

There was a long, long silence.

“Adrien,” she said, eventually, “I… I don’t love you because of what you can _do._ I love you because of who you _are._ And… If you waited for me, that just means that I’ll get to watch you learn.”

He tried to keep his expression steady, but he could feel the tears welling up in his eyes.

“You said, years ago,” said Marinette, stepping back to him, “that I was better than anything you could possibly deserve.”

He nodded, barely able to see, as she placed a hand, gently, on his shoulder.

“I said then that I just needed to make the rest of the world believe it, but… That was the wrong answer.”

She sighed.

“What I should have said…” she swallowed, and he could hear the hitch in her voice, a more controlled version of what his own would have sounded like, “What I want to tell you now… Is that I feel the same about you.”

She leaned forward, and…

Since the invention of the kiss, many have attempted to rate and categorize them, with varying success.

This one…

It would never have won an award as the most beautiful, or the cleanest, but…

They meant it.

Sobbing, holding onto each other for support, _finally_ together, for good… They meant it.

_-The End-_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for reading! I hope you've enjoyed the story, mostly stolen though it may be.  
This is the first long-fic I've finished in a while that hasn't gotten more attention than the previous one, and I've got to say, it's a testament to those of you who showed up for it that I found the energy to keep writing it.
> 
> Special thanks go out to:  
Those of you who haven't even watched the Princess Bride, but still read this; I hope it wasn't too obvious while you were reading.   
Anyone who read all the way to this point, and especially people like flowersandsunshine, IncognitoPhenomenon, and Hugh D. Martin, whose regular comments kept me wanting to write further.
> 
> Finally, I always tend to link people to another of my stories that they might like at the end of these.  
This being my first full on overhaul AU, I'm afraid I don't have any others quite like it, but I'd suggest for your consideration 'No Ring? No Problem,' which has, in my mind, a similar fluff/action distribution, and also features Marinette being the only one of them with a Miraculous.  
And, since I referenced it last chapter, you might consider The Medusa Challenge, in which Adrien is paralyzed and detransformed, and Marinette is forced to keep her eyes shut while making sure he doesn't starve.


End file.
